


Incidence

by EntameWitchLulu



Series: Halloween Specials [7]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: Blood, Body Horror, College Age!Cast, Cults, Demon Summoning, Demonic Possession, Demons, Gen, Human Sacrifice, Kidnapping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2020-01-19
Packaged: 2020-10-27 07:44:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 26
Words: 98,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20756825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EntameWitchLulu/pseuds/EntameWitchLulu
Summary: Yuya is used to odd -- he's in theater, after all.  But the oddness that's starting to creep ever tighter around him and his friends is a different sort of odd.  People are disappearing, his friend Reiji has been distant and distracted, and Yuya's pretty sure he's being followed.  But everything comes to a head when Yuya is rescued from an attempted kidnapping by a mysterious stranger, only to find that Yuzu has been kidnapped instead.  If Yuya and his friends want to survive the coming night, it will take every scrap of courage and will they have.When the doors to hell are open, it's sometimes difficult to tell who the real monster is...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> HEY Y'ALL SURPRISE i do in fact have a halloween special this year lol. And yes it's arc v again. I'm sorry if anyone thought I was going to do VR (though I think I said last year I wouldn't but...still sorry;;;)
> 
> Unlike previous specials, this one has absolutely nothing to do with my canon universe or the previous specials in any way shape or form! It's a total AU lol.
> 
> And finally, PLEASE TAKE THE WARNINGS SERIOUSLY!!! It gets bloody from chapter one so please take care of yourselves if that's not your speed lol.
> 
> Without further ado, thank you for reading and I hope you'll enjoy! Happy Halloween!

It was the shrieking that was the truly annoying bit of it.

Researching sigils and summoning circles, picking out appropriate sacrificial targets and stalking them, kidnapping, and the actual sacrificial bit, that was all easy. No, it was the shrieking that really got on one’s nerves. The babbling and screaming, the tears, not just from the lamb but from any other rats that tried to come and “rescue” it.

“Let her go, let her go, let her go,” the man kept begging, continuing to throw himself uselessly against the bondage that strapped him tightly to the pillar at the other end of the summoning circle, two brothers on either side of him to keep careful watch that he wouldn’t escape before the ceremony ended. It was a damn shame he couldn’t be gagged during the ceremony. “Please, I beg of you, please!”

The girl wouldn’t stop screaming either, even through the cloth stuffed between her teeth. She screamed and struggled, digging her heels into the earth as one of the brothers dragged her forward by her bound hands, a pair of sisters pushing at her back to stop her from truly bracing herself.

He rapped his fingers against his arm, arms folded tightly as he watched them fight with her to the altar in the center of the circle. It had been painstakingly carved into the stone, each of the proper sigils and runes, the pathways to lead the demonic magic once her blood had been spilled. Hand-sculpted pillars sat at the proper orientation all around the outside of the circle, including the one that the man was tied to — he made a poor excuse for a vessel, but better to use the father than to waste one of the brethren. Willing every brother and sister may be, but they were fewer in number than they would all like — and Roget himself didn’t quite align himself with the same willing enthusiasm of his fellows at the idea of becoming a demon’s vessel. 

Either way, it didn’t seem prudent to waste perfectly good followers, not when so much energy had been put into educating them, and besides, the father would need to be disposed of _ anyway _ — at least, that was how Roget justified the decision of the High Priest. It would have been the decision he would have made as well, had he been in charge. And very soon, he was sure, he would be, so it was good to start thinking like he was.

“Brother Roget? We’re nearly ready to begin.”

Roget turned to the sister beside him who had spoken, her cowl pulled over her face. He nodded sharply, and pulled his own hood over his face. The girl kept on _ screaming _. He could hard wait until her throat was slit.

The brethren who struggled with the sacrifice finally managed to chain her kicking limbs down to each corner of the altar, and backed away, moving to the outside of the circle. Roget took his own place in circle, between two of the pillars. The High Priest then emerged from the complex.

He stalked to the edge of the circle, perhaps examining it, though it was impossible to tell with the hood over his eyes. Like the others, he was clad in the black and silver robes with the heavy hood. However, atop it he wore a finely woven chainmail tunic of fine, platinum steel. Holy steel, stolen from less demonic orders — meant to protect him when he stepped into the circle and called upon the demon. The blessed steel would deflect the demon’s eyes, and cause it to seek out the only other living body in the circle — the vessel. 

At least, that was the theory of it. Roget had not yet seen a summoning himself. He hadn’t _ rated high enough _ to be present at the previous summonings, the ones of smaller demons, held for only a brief moment before being released, in preparation for this — the main event.

For this was the day they would call down the demon of war and ashes, the bringer of the apocalypse...and render him in service to the brethren.

The High Priest stepped over the circle’s edge, and made his way to the altar. The girl was still struggling and shrieking — they were less screams than they were _ swears _, Roget was realizing. She was attempting to cuss. It would have been amusing, if he weren’t so annoyed.

The girl wrenched her body back and forth as much as it would go in her chains; her pathetic father was now crying so hard that his pleas were incoherent. She kept trying to shout to him, perhaps, wrenching her body towards his bound form. When the High Priest approached, her head snapped to his instead.

At the very least, there was something to be said for her spirit. Despite the tear tracks down her grimy face, her mussed, matted hair falling from its pigtails, there was still fight in her teary eyes, a sparking anger as the High Priest approached and loomed over her. She threw herself upwards again, as though believing she could break the iron that held her with her own strength.

The High Priest ignored her muffled yells and her writhing form. He looked instead towards the brethren gathered on the outside of the circle.

“Brethren,” he intoned, his voice deep and rumbling. “All of our efforts have led to this day.”

No one spoke, no one responded, but the tension was so thick one might slice it with the ceremonial blade that the High Priest now lifted above his head.

“From the blood of the one whose voice reaches across the many realms, we shall call upon the bringer of endings and strife. With the strength of our souls, we shall bind him, and bring the great beast to our command.”

No one responded to this either, and Roget sighed internally. The grandstanding was all well and good, he would do the same, but it felt so sour coming from a leader that was not himself. No matter. Once this ritual was over, he would have his chance.

The High Priest turned his knife to the lamb. The fight fled her eyes at the sight of it, and she began to struggle still harder, tears rolling from her eyes. Her father began to scream anew. 

The High Priest grabbed the girl by the mouth, pinning her head down and back, baring her throat. Roget put his hands together, along with the rest of those who encircled the summoning circle, and began to chant in tandem with the prayers.

“May the Lord Demon Zarc accept this offering, and come among us!” the High Priest cried.

Before the girl had the chance to let out one more pitiful muffled scream, the knife was in her throat. Blood gushed from the wound, staining the altar beneath her and splattering to the floor, staining her white garments a brilliant crimson even in the darkness.

The father screamed.

The air turned to static, and it took all of Roget’s concentration to continue mumbling the prayers as the air grew thick and difficult to breathe. It was pitch black save for a few measly torches about the circle, and yet...there was something coming down from the sky. A thick black smoke, curling down from somewhere, or nowhere, towards the girl’s body that slowly began to stop twitching. The father kept screaming. The High Priest stepped back, blade stained with blood as the smoke started to fill the circle, curling around almost inquisitively. It poked briefly at the High Priest before turning away from his holy armor. 

Like an amorphous black snake, the smoke slithered and curled around the circle, following the curve of the sigils, coiling around the altar. It nosed its way towards the screaming, sobbing man sagging against his bonds. 

The smoke moved towards the man’s mouth, beginning to feed slowly into it, thin at first, but then thicker, until it seemed to grow black and solid. The demon was here, Roget realized with a start — and it was entering the vessel. This was actually _ working_.

That was the last thought he had before one of the pillars shattered.

Two of the brethren stopped chanting, screaming as they dove out of the way of the flying shards of debris. Another pillar on the opposite side shattered as well, breaking the chants. The High Priest whirled towards the debris, cloak sliding back to see his eyes widening with shock. This...wasn’t part of it. This wasn’t part of the ritual.

The debris started to swirl around the circle like a whirlwind. More of the brethren had to duck, stop chanting to avoid being battered or impaled. The circle cracked as though an earthquake had suddenly shook the earth beneath them. The altar shattered, dropping its dead weight to the ground. 

The smoke began to roil and billow. It swirled and then worked up into a massive tornado, bulging and flaring at the edges of the circle. It expanded until it filled the whole of the circle, joining the maelstrom of rocks and torn branches that began to rend through the air. It didn’t seem to be able to escape the circle, as though it pushed against some invisible glass containing it — but in places, it began to bulge and bubble past the edge of the circle, like it was starting to boil. The air was hot and sparking and Roget could hardly breathe for the taste of the overwhelming _power_ that stained the air. Was this — was this the demon? Was this power the demon?

The deadly whirlwind of stones picked up — the trees around the stone courtyard groaned, the forest outside the complex rumbling as though some gigantic monster were crashing through the trees. Birds and bats exploded from the trees, shrieking. A herd of deer burst from the woods, fleeing from something no one could see, avoiding the circle as they bolted for the safety of the mountains behind the complex.

A tree exploded from the ground and joined the whirlwind, another was ripped out by the roots, one of them toppled and crushed a fleeing brother. A flash of sudden lightning roared from the clear night sky, thunder rumbling and shaking the ground. Roget hit the ground, head spinning as stones and trees and leaves swirled ever faster over head. 

The High Priest could only stare with shock, unable to move, as a tree flung itself directly into him, crushing him to the ground.

The world screamed and shook. The ground cracked, the remaining pillars shattered, and the a blazing heat consumed the air for a moment, threatening to set everything on fire — 

When Roget came to, his ears rang so loud he did not at first notice the deafening silence.

He had ended up on his back, half covered in debris — but, remarkably, he seemed to be mostly uninjured. He coughed dust from his lungs as he sat up, sending stones scattering from his body. He pressed a hand to his mouth as he tried to breathe.

“Brother Roget? Is that you?”

Roget didn’t recognize the brother who came scrambling over the debris towards him, but he accepted the hand to his feet, legs shaking.

“What happened?” he said.

The brother shook his head, cowl thrown back and face paled.

“All of the calculations should have been correct,” he said. “We checked and double-checked...it seems the demon may have been stronger than we anticipated.”

“The High Priest?”

The brother shook his head. Roget didn’t bother looking mournful.

This had been a disaster — however, he knew an opportunity when he saw one.

“How many survived?”

“Not many, but we’re still searching,” the brother said.

Roget scanned the circle, and frowned at the wreckage. It was hardly recognizable anymore. Trees and debris littered the ground, cracks and juts of stone disfigured the earth. 

The vessel and the dead sacrifice remained, however, the girl’s body draped over a tree, and the man still bound to the last, unshattered pillar, unconscious or dead, impossible to tell.

“Do you have any idea what caused this to happen?”

The brother shook his head again.

“We’re still forming theories, trying to...double check the calculations. There may have been a sigil wrong...it may not have been enough blood...the circle may not have been large enough to contain the demon....she may not have been the correct sacrifice after all.”

Roget snorted. Too many mistakes and cut corners. Too rushed, too hurried to get to the main event, not willing enough to take all the time necessary, to be patient. This was why he should have been in charge in the first place.

“Gather up the others you can,” he said. “We will abandon this place and find another.”

He was pleased that the brother bowed without questioning his authority.

“What of the sacrifice and the vessel?” he asked.

Roget waved a hand.

“Leave them. They’re no longer of use to us. We will have to start fresh. If we play our cards right, it will be of more benefit to us to leave the bodies than to try to hide them.”

The brother nodded, and quickly hurried off to find the rest of the brethren.

Roget turned his eyes to the wrecked summoning circle, the torn holes in the forest. Such_ power _, he couldn’t help but think. If that had just been the moment of summoning...

A slow smile spread over his face.

Perhaps tonight hadn’t been such a disaster after all.


	2. Chapter 2

Thunder rumbled in the distance, and Yuya stopped on the sidewalk, shooting a glance over his shoulder.

The sky hung heavy and gray overhead, making the afternoon seem darker than it should. It stained the college campus a faint, stormy green. A few of the small street lamps along the pathways were already flickering on as the trees between them began to undulate in the wind that gusted briefly around them. Yuya bit his lip, squinting behind him. Was he imagining things...? Was that a person standing under that streetlight, or was that just the shadow of the trees moving around? His stomach twisted — god, he was getting paranoid lately.

He watched it for a moment longer, but finally decided it was just the shadow. Stupid, he chided himself. Why would anyone be following him? He turned and hurried towards the door of the auditorium, pulling it open and slipping inside — his heart hammered in spite of himself.

“Think fast!”

He was so distracted, that for once, he didn’t catch the hacky sack flung at his face. It bounced off his cheek, and automatically he snatched his hand out for it to fall into it.

“Oops,” Sora said, laughing. “I  _ told _ you to think fast! You usually catch it!”

Yuya grinned, feeling his nerves wipe away — it was the only warning he gave Sora before he hurled the hacky sack back. Sora laughed, clapping the sack between both hands before it could hit him in the face. Yuzu ducked away from his stumble backward and caught him against the back.

“You’re here for just two seconds and you’re already making a scene,” she said, shaking her head with a smile. “Hey, Yuya, you’re late. Masumi’s going to blow a gasket.”

“Oops,” Yuya said, wincing. “Sorry, got caught up in...office hours.”

He bit back the truth, but from the way Yuzu’s eyes briefly narrowed, it was clear she didn’t buy it. She’d definitely push him later, but for now, she let it pass. He breathed out as the three of them headed down the aisle of seats towards the stage. Gongenzaka and the twins were up there already, Gongenzaka lifting up a part of the backdrop so that Tsukikage could roll underneath it and check something. He rattled off a few numbers to Hikage hovering over him, who wrote them down on a notepad.

“Sakaki Yuya! How dare you arrive late!”

Sawatari launched himself to his feet from one of the front rows, arms folded tightly over his chest and chin jutted out.

“You have the  _ temporary  _ honor of being our shows leading role!” he said, thrusting a finger at Yuya’s chest. “And you dare to arrive past call time?? If you aren’t careful, I’ll be taking all of your roles!”

Yuya laughed, playfully pushing Sawatari’s finger away from him.

“Sorry, sorry,” he said. “But it looks like I’m not the only one who isn’t here yet.”

The auditorium was surprisingly empty. Most of the cast didn’t appear to be here — besides Sawatari, the only other two actors in the seats were Dennis, and Selena, the newest addition to the theater club. Dennis raised his coffee with a wink at Yuya. Selena didn’t look up from her script, frowning and screwing up her face at it. She was probably worried about her lines; she’d joined in so late after she’d transferred here, and she wasn’t the most confident actress yet. Yuzu had convinced her to try it out after she’d moved into the dorm room next to hers, but she didn’t seem to take to it very well.

“Really? Is this everyone?” Yuya said, frowning.

“Lazy louts, all of them,” Sawatari sniffed. “They’ll be sorry when I, the great Neo New Sawatari, take all of their roles.”

Sora laughed.

“All of them?” he said. “At once? I’d pay to see that.”

“We’re thinking the storm warning chased a bunch of people off,” Dennis said as Yuya, Yuzu, and Sora slid into the aisle behind them.

“I’ll bet they’re scared about that girl who went missing from the gas station, too,” Sora said, bouncing in his seat with a gleam in his eye. Yuya knew  _ that  _ look — that was the look Sora got before relaying some terrible story he read on the nosleep reddit. Yuya groaned. Yuzu looked a little pale.

“Didn’t she just steal stuff and run away?” Selena said, looking up from her script finally.

“Nuh-uh,” Sora said, shaking his head enough to flop his ponytail against the sides of his head. “The place was  _ trashed _ , and she tried to call the cops beforehand, but it got cut off before she could say anything. When they got there she was gone, and all of the security video was erased too.”

“Definitely sounds like a robbery coverup, to be honest,” said Dennis.

“Nothing was taken! No money, nothing!”

“Um, can we talk about something else?” Yuzu said, but Sora didn’t seem to hear her, leaning forward to the edge of his seat.

“She’s not even the first person! Two kids went missing from that college campus in the town over a few weeks ago, too!”

Yuzu looked like she was going to be sick, and Yuya was about to tell Sora to knock it off when someone lightly hit Sora on the head with a script from behind. Sora glanced up, blinking with surprise, and the whole group turned to look up. It was sort of surprising to see Reiji standing behind them. He didn’t often leave his booth during breaks or to mingle before rehearsals.

After a moment’s pause, long enough to be awkward, Reiji finally said something.

“This isn’t such a topic for polite company,” he said. “Please be mindful of others’ sensitivities.”

He tilted his head towards Yuzu, and Sora glanced at her. He seemed to notice how pale she was for the first time, and his face fell. He looked down at his knees.

“Sorry, Yuzu,” he mumbled.

“It’s...okay,” Yuzu said, trying to smile.

Yuya relaxed, too, finally feeling a little more comfortable himself. He definitely didn’t want to think about kidnappings and stuff when he’d been feeling like...

He banished the thought. Stupid! No one was following him. Why would anyone be following him?

Reiji tucked his script beneath his arm.

“Have any of you perhaps seen where I put the spike tape down? Kotsu-san needs to mark down some set pieces.”

“I haven’t,” said Dennis.

Sora shook his head. Yuya, however, glanced down at Reiji’s wrist. The roll of tape was resting there around his wrist.

“Uhh, Reiji, I think you’re wearing it.”

Reiji blinked. He looked down to see the tape there.

“...ah,” he said. “You’re right. Thank you, Sakaki-kun.”

He nodded briefly, and then slid out of the aisle to walk towards the stage again. Yuya watched him go, frowning.

“Is it just me,” he said, “or has Reiji seemed a little... _ off _ , lately?”

“He’s always like that,” said Dennis. “Quiet and weird. I think it comes with the territory.”

“What’s what supposed to mean?” Yuzu said.

“You know,” Dennis said, gesturing with his coffee cup. “Rich. Heir to a big company. They’re always either strange and reclusive, or insufferable idiots.”

He shot a meaningful glance in Sawatari’s direction, wiggling his eyebrows. Sawatari did not seem to notice the jibe, huffing and folding his arms.

“Akaba had better get his act in the game if he’s going to run this show properly,” he said. “Honestly! What even possessed him to join  _ theater _ ?”

Dennis made another wiggly eyebrow look in Sawatari’s direction, and Sora snickered behind his hand. Yuya rolled his eyes. Still, Sawatari made a decent point. Yuya didn’t know Reiji all that well — they’d only been friends by association, by working on the same shows for the past year and a half. But it had been the topic of much discussion as to why Reiji, the heir to a large electronics corporation, had decided to become the stage manager for the college theater club. Someone like him seemed like he’d be in student council, or at least a fraternity. Something with leadership opportunities and connections.

“Okay, but really,” Yuya said, pulling the conversation back. “He’s not really the type to forget that he’s got the tape on his wrist, right?”

They all exchanged a glance.

“You have a point,” Yuzu said. “He lost his cue sheet yesterday too.”

“How does he do that? He’s got at least three of them,” said Selena.

“Six of them,” Dennis corrected. “And they’re all laminated and posted in multiple locations, with back ups in his binder.”

“Egghead,” Sora muttered around the lollipop he’d just stuffed into his mouth.

“He forgot where he put my prop yesterday too,” Yuya said. “Do you think he’s okay?”

Yuzu frowned, leaning back in her seat.

“Maybe he’s got some problems at home?” she said. “I see him on his phone a lot. With a weird expression.”

“Weird how?” Selena asked.

Yuzu just shrugged helplessly, clearly not able to describe it. Yuya glanced off in the direction that Reiji had gone. He frowned. There was something definitely going on with him. Yuya wasn’t really that  _ close _ with Akaba Reiji...they had never hung out outside of theater. But if something was bothering him...

“I’ll be right back,” he said. “If Masumi starts yelling, call me back.”

“Will do,” Yuzu said, shooting him a peace sign.

Yuya hopped from his seat and sidled out of the aisle, hurrying to the stage stairs. He ducked around the drawn back curtains into the dim wing, where he’d seen Reiji go. 

He was already back at his tech booth, perched on a stool and frowning at his phone. The light of the screen illuminated his face in an almost spooky sort of way.

“Hey, uh...Reiji?”

Reiji blinked, startling up from his screen. He turned it off quickly before he turned towards Yuya. Yuya immediately felt as though he’d been interrupting him. He hesitated a minute, shifting from foot to foot.

“Are you okay?” he finally blurted. “I mean. If it’s okay for me to ask. You know you can always talk to me if you need to, about anything, if anything’s bothering you, or, uh. Yeah.”

He quickly shut up as he realized he was rambling. For a moment, Reiji only seemed to consider him. Then a faint, but, Yuya thought, appreciative smile briefly graced his lips.

“Thank you,” he said. “I do appreciate that, Sakaki-kun.”

Yuya waited to see if he would elaborate, and for a moment, it seemed he might not. Then he shook his head, sighed, and tucked his phone back into his pocket.

“It’s only some family business,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to involve you.”

_ Oh _ , Yuya said.  _ Yuzu was right after all _ .

“I don’t mind being involved,” Yuya said.

Reiji’s smile was a little kinder and more visible.

“Thank you,” he said again. “I’ll remember that.”

The doors to the back hall burst open, and two of them turned towards it. Masumi came storming through, her rolled up script bunched in her hand. Her eyes fell on them first, and Yuya braced for the scolding he was about to get for being late.

“Well, at least you tried to show up,” she grumbled. “Both of you, we’re canceling rehearsal tonight.”

“What? Why?” Yuya said.

Masumi rolled her eyes, and when she spoke, she sounded as though she hated every word of it.

“Unfortunately, the storm warning is so bad that our club sponsor is  _ ordering _ us back to our dorms,” she said. “ _ Honestly.  _ The first weeks of practice are the most important, and she’s letting a storm scare us off?!”

Yuya tried to hide a smile. By the end of rehearsal, Masumi would be claiming that the last weeks of practice were the ones that were the most important.

“Anyway, you guys are free to go,” she said. “My roommates came to pick me up, so you can tell the others.”

She stormed back through the door she’d come from, and Yuya and Reiji exchanged a glance. Yuya shrugged.

“Well, I guess we get a night off then,” he said, jokingly.

For a moment, he considered asking Reiji to come and hang out for a bit — he looked  _ really _ tired the more he looked at him. Maybe he needed some company. But they’d never hung out  _ before _ , and if the storm really was that bad, he’d probably get Reiji stuck over at Yuya’s dorm...

He decided against it, and Reiji was already standing up from his stool with a sigh.

“I suppose we do,” he said. “Will you or any of the others need a ride home?”

“Oh, nah, thanks though. Our dorms are like a five minute walk.”

Reiji nodded quietly, and then the two of them headed out from the wings to tell the others the news.

“Preposterous,” Sawatari grumbled. “We can’t be skipping on practice this early in the game!”

“What about Masumi? Is she getting home safe?” Yuzu asked worriedly.

“She said her roommates came to pick her up,” Yuya said, and Yuzu relaxed. Masumi lived off campus with two of her friends from high school, and while she normally walked to and from campus, one of her roommates, Yaiba, could drive, and sometimes gave the other two rides.

Everyone picked up their things and headed out of the auditorium. The wind was really roaring now, sending the leaves of the trees into a frenzy. It was a cold, brisk wind, the kind of autumn storm that threatens to rip the leaves off of the trees before they can even turn colors. Yuya rose a hand over his face to try and keep his hair from blowing all over his eyes.

Reiji bid them goodbye and headed towards the parking lot, then Yuya, Yuzu, and Selena waved to the rest of the group and headed in the opposite direction. Yuya’s building was next to Yuzu and Selena’s.

“Ugh, this looks super bad,” Yuya complained as they hiked into the wind. The trees were going  _ wild _ , and as though in response to Yuya’s comment, thunder cracked directly overhead, practically shaking the ground.

Yuzu squeaked with shock, grabbing hold of Selena’s and Yuya’s arms at the same time.

“That was a big one,” Selena muttered, her brow furrowing.

“Let’s just get inside!!” Yuzu gasped.

They ran the rest of the way to Yuzu and Selena’s dorm building just as the first rain drops started to fall.

“Yuya, you can stay over with me tonight if you want,” Yuzu said as they ducked under the overhang by the door and Selena swiped her card key.

“I’m literally right next door,” Yuya said, pointing to the building right next to theirs. “I’ll be fine. I’ve got some homework that’s due tomorrow morning anyway — definitely shouldn’t have taken that 8am.”

Yuzu looked like she was getting ready to argue, but then sighed and shook her head.

“Text me when you get into your dorm room,” she said, squeezing his hands.

“Will do, mom.”

She lightly smacked him on the side of the head, and he laughed, batting her away. He jumped down the stairs backwards and waved at the girls as he bolted towards his dorm.

It really only was a handful of feet from one building to the next, but the minute he was alone, he regretted not taking Yuzu up on her offer. For some reason, the jog seemed unbearably long, and his eyes began to twitch at shadows again. He fought back the thoughts, and the desire to let Sora’s story about the kidnappings enter his mind.  _ No one is following me!!! Why would anyone be following me?? I’m right here anyway!! _

He scrambled up the steps to the dorm door, fumbling his card key from his pocket and slapping it to the pad.

He breathed a sigh of relief at the sound of the door unlocking, and snatched at the handle.

That was when the hand latched around his mouth, and the needle sunk into his neck.


	3. Chapter 3

Yuya tried to fight. He clawed at the hand around his mouth as the strength drained out of his fingers and limbs, as the weight of the drugs began to drag at his body. He kicked wildly as he was dragged back down the stairs, trying to force a sound through his throat and around the fingers clamped over his lips, but he couldn’t get anything out of his lungs.

His slumped body crumpled to the ground with the arms still holding fast to him, and he felt the rough burlap of a sack getting pulled over his head as the hand finally moved away. Wind screamed around him so loud he could hardly hear what was happening, and rain began to scatter over his arms.

And then there was a thwump and the sound of air rushing out of someone’s lungs, and the hands slid off of Yuya. He slumped to the ground, face pressed into the fabric — he couldn’t see anything, and he couldn’t get his body to move. He tried with all of his might to force even a finger to lift, but his body felt so  _ heavy _ . He tried desperately just to breathe through his nose. Thunder rumbled as the rain began to strike against him with more fervor.

Overhead, he heard more muffled thumps, a muffled swear, and then several hisses of pain, but it was all muffled by the wind, the rain hitting the sidewalk, and the occasional crack of thunder. He felt rather than saw a body collapse next to him with a heavy thump onto the sidewalk. What...what was...

An awful choking sound cut above the wind for just a moment, and then, there was nothing but the wind and the rain, and Yuya laying there, paralyzed — he couldn’t even reach for his phone. How long since he had left Yuzu? She’d definitely worry if he didn’t text soon, and maybe she’d come and...come and...

He felt so tired. He could hardly keep his eyes open.

He couldn’t fight as he felt someone’s arms slide under his body, propping him up. He heard the man’s voice over him swearing as he fumbled to drag Yuya beneath the overhang of the dorm, out of the rain. He might have heard a soft swear as a hand pressed briefly to the side of his neck. The man’s face snapped up then, staring at something that Yuya couldn’t see, and he swore again. He fumbled at Yuya’s hand, yanking the dorm key from his fingers, and slapped it against the door. Yuya heard the soft beep of the door unlocking.

Then Yuya couldn’t keep himself awake any longer, and he drifted down into blackness.

* * *

Yuzu shivered as she waited for the kettle to heat up, rubbing her hands together and then tucking them beneath her scarf. 

“It’s really coming down out there,” Selena said, looking out the lounge room window.

Yuzu pressed her lips together nervously. She pulled out her phone again to check for messages. Still nothing from Yuya. It had been almost ten minutes, it couldn’t take him  _ that _ long to get back into his room. She quickly shot off a message to him, detailing how mad she was going to be if he’d forgotten to tell her he was safe in his room.

The kettle began to hiss, and she pulled it from the stove top, turning it off. Last thing they needed was to accidentally set off the fire alarm with a storm like this.

“Did you want some, Sel?” she asked.

“Oh, uh, sure, thanks.”

Yuzu poured two mugs and dropped the tea bags into them, putting the kettle aside. She fumbled for her phone again as she moved one of them in front of Selena, then brought her own to the little table and sat down. She really ought to be studying, but this storm...

Thunder roared, shaking the foundation of the house, and Yuzu shivered. Selena sipped at her tea while Yuzu shot another message to Yuya’s phone.

“Heard back from Yuya yet?” she asked.

“No. I’m going to kill him.”

Yuzu groaned, pushing her tea out of the way so that she could flop her head down against her arms. The rain pattered against the windows, filling up the otherwise silent lounge. It was kind of weird that there wasn’t anyone out here watching television or something. Then again, it was Friday. A lot of people probably had gone home for the weekend already. Yuzu’s roommate hadn’t been here when she got in — she’d gone home without saying anything again, to Yuzu’s annoyance. Honestly, couldn’t that girl talk to her maybe  _ once _ , so she wouldn’t worry about whether her roomie had gotten kidnapped?

That made her mind stray uncomfortably close to Sora’s conversation topic earlier, and she shivered. She sat up with her chin on the table again to hold her phone in front of her face, sending an angrier text to Yuya. The next one, she was going to call him. 

She sighed as she put her phone down and pulled her tea closer to her.

“You don’t have to stay up with me,” she said. “If you have studying to do or something.”

Selena just shook her head, tea held to her lips. She was staring down into the dark liquid with a strange, faraway look. It didn’t seem to match her — Yuzu had only known Selena for a few weeks, but she was a pretty impulsive person. She’d found that out when Sawatari had dared her to drink an entire glass of lemon juice and she’d downed it like a shot, only to find out that it had had salt in it, and  _ still _ swallowed it. Sawatari was still annoyingly obvious about his crush on her since then, which Selena hadn’t seemed to notice. Either way, Selena wasn’t the type to be introspective, at least from what Yuzu knew of her.

“Hey,” Yuzu said. “Everything all right?”

Selena blinked, seeming to startle out of a reverie. She bit her lip as she put her mug down on the table. For a moment, she didn’t say anything, not meeting Yuzu’s eyes.

“I’m not sure,” she finally said, and Yuzu frowned. She sat up straight, sliding her hand across the table to touch Selena’s. Selena moved her hands away, and Yuzu didn’t chase after them.

“You want to talk about anything?” she asked. “Is something wrong?”

Selena looked quickly down at her tea as she pressed her hands into her legs.

“I...Yuzu, I...” she fumbled. She bit her lip again, still not meeting Yuzu’s eyes. “Yuzu, what do you do when you have a really hard decision to make?”

Yuzu blinked, frowning. Where was this coming from?

“Can you...explain maybe?” she asked, trying to smile. “I mean, I’m not sure the context.”

“Let’s say you...for a long time, you did something because it made...your parents happy, or something,” Selena said, waving her hand aimlessly through the air. “But you’ve started to think that maybe. Maybe it’s a bad thing. But you’ve been doing it for so long, and you don’t know what to do. Can you just stop? What if you don’t know how?”

The words tumbled out of her like she wasn’t even thinking about them, like she was just trying to expel them from some place within her she hadn’t realized they were blocked up. Yuzu frowned as she leaned back in her chair. She wasn’t totally getting it, but...was...was Selena coming out to her? She’d sort of had a feeling, maybe. Maybe she was even confessing?? Yuzu’s cheeks warmed as she brushed that idea aside, that was a little conceited when Selena was clearly in a pinch here.

“Well, if it’s something you don’t want to do, you shouldn’t have to,” she said carefully. “Even if it makes your parents happy — you have to live for yourself, too, don’t you?”

“It might be dangerous to stop,” Selena said, staring at the table.

She was  _ definitely  _ coming out of the closet here. Yuzu wasn’t sure why she was so nervous about it; Yuzu had been wearing her bisexual t-shirt the day they met, so Selena must know she was around people like her, right? She smiled as she cupped her tea in both hands, inhaling the soft warm that billowed over her nose.

“I might not know all of your details here,” she said. “But if you’re trying to decide what to do, I don’t think you need to force it if you don’t feel safe. Do what you have to for now, okay? You’ll have people around you to support you, too.”

Selena’s bangs fell over her eyes as she slumped forward a little bit, resting her head between her hands. She looked even more conflicted than before. Yuzu bit her lip, wondering what else she could do or say, especially when Selena was being so cryptic about it. She decided to take a sip of her tea while the silence stretched on.

Selena let out a soft, choked breath.

“Yuzu, I’m sorry,” she said, voice cracking.

Yuzu blinked. Her lips parted. Sorry for what...?

She blinked again. Why were her eyes getting so heavy? She put her tea down as her hands started to shake from the weight of it. Her head was...spinning...

Slowly, she slumped forward in her seat as she found she no longer had the strength to sit upright. What was — what was going — 

_ Oh my god _ , she thought, as she started to black out.  _ Selena drugged me. _

* * *

Yuya awoke with a start — instantly he remembered what had happened. The hand over his mouth. The needle in his neck. The storm overhead.

He tried to struggle upwards, gasping for air, eyes wide — where was he, who had taken him — 

“Hey, calm down. You’re going to make yourself sick.”

A hand held him gently but firmly by the shoulder, and he panicked. 

“G-get away from me!” he managed to slur out, whipping his heavy arms around. 

He didn’t hit anything, but the hand released him.

“ _ Breathe _ ,” the voice said. “Dammit. Get a hold of yourself. I’m not one of the guys who jumped you.

Yuya tried, he tried to suck greedy gulps of air into his lungs, but it only made him dizzier. Where was he? It was so dark — where were they?? He was laying against something soft and plush, and there was something draped over him, like a blanket of some kind? His hair and clothes were still wet from the rainstorm, and he shivered, pulling the blanket-thing over him a little more.

He heard the soft click of a light flicking on, and he blinked, squinting. 

He...he knew where he was. This was the downstairs lounge, the one in the basement really only the kids playing DND used because otherwise, it was kind of creepy. The only light came from the small lamp on the table beside the couch he’d been laid across, and now that he could see, he realized the blanket-thing was a long purple jacket.

He looked up, squinting through his blurred vision to the shape that hovered over him.

The guy was tall, definitely taller than Yuya even though he was kneeling next to the couch right now. He didn’t seem to be too much older, though, maybe a few years. His face was sharp and angled, and a dark swoop of bangs fell across his forehead and between his flint-hard, hazel-yellow eyes.

Yuzu shied back from him automatically, heart hammering in his chest. As he gripped the jacket to his chest, however, he realized that the other man was wearing nothing but a tank top (which showed off incredibly nice biceps). Was...this  _ his _ jacket?

“What’s going on?” Yuya managed to get out, feeling bile rise in his throat.

“Don’t move too much. You might throw up,” the man said.

“T-those...those guys who...”

“They can’t get in. You’re not in danger.”

Yuya wasn’t sure if that was completely true, since he appeared to be locked into a basement with only one exit, which he now noticed was blocked with another couch to prop the door closed, with a complete stranger, after having been knocked out. On the other hand, he  _ was _ in his dorm, at least. And he seemed to sort of remember there being some kind of fight before he’d passed out.

Yuya tried to breathe, briefly letting his eyes close until his head settle. Then he struggled to sit up, despite a soft protest from the other man. He didn’t stop him from sitting up and swinging his legs around, however, so that he was sitting facing the man. 

“Okay,” he said. “I’m awake. Can you tell me what’s going on, and why I shouldn’t be afraid of you?”

The man considered him for a moment. Then he shrugged. He stood up, dusting off the knees of his pants.

“My name is Kurosaki Shun,” he said. “And you almost got kidnapped.”

“And you just happened to be around to stop them?” Yuya said, feeling a little dubious.

“Not just happened to. I’d been following you because I thought you’d be a target.”

This took a moment to sink in. Then Yuya’s eyes widened. He shrunk back, as he remembered the shadows he thought he’d imagined, the feeling of someone’s eyes on him, for  _ weeks _ .

“You were  _ following  _ me?” he said, horrified.

“Because I thought you’d be a target,” Kurosaki repeated, with a sort of irritated patience.

“A target? For what? Why didn’t you call the police??”

“Because they’re damn useless and won’t listen to me,” Kurosaki snapped. “If you want to know what’s going on, I need you to shut up and let me explain!”

The anger on his face receded when Yuya flinched, and he took a small step back. He took a deep breath and ran his hand through his hair.

“Sorry,” he said.

He  _ did _ sound sorry, but Yuya still wasn’t sure he trusted this situation a bit. He didn’t have much of a choice but to listen, though. Kurosaki took another deep breath. Then he sat down in one of the armchairs across the from the couch, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

“Look,” he said. “You’ve been out for a few hours. The only reason we’re in here with the door blockaded is because there were too many guys for me to handle myself.” 

He sounded irritated to have to admit that, his hands curling briefly into fists.

“I’d been keeping an eye on you because I thought you or your girlfriend was going to end up a target, and I was right. I thought that if I could catch one of the bastards that kidnapped my sister and best friend, I could force them to tell me where they were. But there were too many for me to take, and if I let them get away with you, I’d probably lose one of my last chances to track the bastards down.”

“Whoa, whoa,” Yuya said, holding up both hands. “Back up. My girlfriend?”

“Girl with the pigtails I always see you with.”

Yuya flushed, waving both his hands back and forth.

“We’re not dating!” he said. “And — anyway, wait, what are you talking about...your friend and sister were  _ kidnapped _ ? And you think that has something to do with this?”

Kurosaki rolled his eyes at the first comment, but didn’t push it. He nodded then. He reached over to pull his jacket from Yuya, and Yuya handed it back. He reached into the jacket pocket. Yuya tensed, his mind immediately jumping to  _ gun _ — even though he’d just been using it as a blanket, and there hadn’t been anything weighty in it.

“About a month back, my sister, Ruri, and my best friend, Yuto, went missing,” he said. “The police told me they probably just skipped out of town, went on a road trip. But I know better, those two would never do that without telling me. And besides...”

He pulled a small, crumpled photo from his pocket, and Yuya relaxed. He passed the photo across the space to Yuya. Yuya hesitated before taking it. He frowned. And then he sucked in a breath.

The image had Kurosaki in it, and three others, all of them pretty clearly crunched into one of those purikura booths. In front of him were three faces, each that looked a little frighteningly familiar — the boy in the middle, in particular, made Yuya’s skin crawl, as for a moment he felt like he was looking into a mirror. This boy had spiked black and purple hair, though, despite the eerie similarities of their faces. And on either side of him...both girls looked remarkably similar to Yuzu, in the sort of way you might mistake a pair of friends for sisters. One of them had long dark hair in an intricate bun, and the other was...

“That’s...that’s...” Yuya fumbled.

“We knew her as Celina at Heartland University, but from what I’ve heard, she calls herself something else here.”

Yuya swallowed thickly as he stared down at Selena’s face. What was she  _ doing _ in this photo? With these people? Sure, she’d only just transferred in a few weeks ago, but...and why would she have been going by a different name?

“Celina transferred to Heartland about...maybe four months ago,” Kurosaki said. “She met Ruri through Ruri’s birdwatching club, and they became friends. They started hanging out, and then she joined the rest of our group.”

Birdwatching? That didn’t stound like Selena’s thing at all. Was this even the same person, or yet another person who looked weirdly like she was related to Yuzu?

“About a month back, Ruri, Yuto, and Celina all went out to a club,” Kurosaki said. “I had a test to study for, so I stayed home. They never came back. The police didn’t suspect foul play and told me they probably just went for a trip. Called them dumb college kids.”

Kurosaki let out a brief, angry hiss.

“That’s...that’s not a possibility, huh?” Yuya said, fighting back nerves as he handed the photo back. His mind was suddenly reminded of Sora’s conversation earlier today — the college students who went missing.

“Ruri and Yuto weren’t stupid,” Kurosaki said. “They never would have just decided to go someplace without telling me. Ruri might forget to tell me if they changed plans, but Yuto was always making sure we texted each other for every little thing.”

He stared at the photo for a moment, his eyes softening. Then he stuffed it back into his pocket.

“So I started looking for them myself. I searched all over the place, looked for clues, and was close to giving up — til I passed your group by in Maiami one night, and I saw Celina.”

Yuya tensed. If...if Selena had only transferred in a few weeks ago, and Ruri and Yuto were still missing...but no, wait, was he really listening to all of this? This guy could be lying to him, after all. Ruri and Yuto might not be gone, or might not be real somehow, or....or why would this guy be telling such a convoluted lie?

“She didn’t see me, and she was acting as though she’d been in your little group forever. That’s when I noticed you and that other girl — you both look similar to Yuto and Ruri, so...”

He hesitated.

“I still wasn’t ready to claim that Celina had kidnapped them or something. Maybe it was a dumb coincidence. Or another girl who just happened to look a lot like her. But then there was the gas station.”

“My friend was talking about that yesterday,” Yuya said eyes widening. “Are you saying...?”

Kurosaki nodded. He pulled out his phone and flicked through a few images, then passed it to Yuya. Yuya held it with trembling hands, staring at the screencap of the news article there. There was a blurry image of a security camera feed there, accompanied by the image of the gas station attendant who’d gone missing — a stocky girl with a short green bob and...and a face eerily reminiscent of Yuzu’s and Selena’s. Another one. He shivered. Then he squinted at the blurry security camera image — it seemed to show the girl at the counter, and a lanky boy frozen in the middle of whirling towards the door, one arm flung out as though to block the girl behind him, while the girl was reaching for the phone. It was impossible to see who was at the door.

“That was the last image the cameras got before it went out,” Kurosaki said. “And they didn’t report on this other guy, but I’m willing to bet he was taken too. I’m even more willing to bet that he looked like you and Yuto.”

Yuya’s head spun. This was — this was all  _ crazy. _

“But what does it mean?” he gasped. “Why would...why would this be happening?”

Kurosaki shrugged as he took his phone back.

“I don’t have the slightest fucking clue. I can’t figure out a connection between you guys except that you look similar.”

“And why didn’t you tell the police?” Yuya asked again.

“I told you — they’re useless,” he snapped. Then he shook his head. “I  _ did _ bring this to them. They dismissed me and ignored it. I think part of them suspects  _ I _ did something to Ruri and Yuto.”

His lips curled, and then he closed his eyes.

“Look, listen,” he said, “the police aren’t going to believe me, even if I told them about you getting jumped. They think I’m a conspiracy nut, and I got into a lot of fights as a kid so they’re not inclined to think well of me. My only shot was following you around and seeing if maybe you got targeted — then I thought I could get one of the bastards and make them tell me what was going on.”

Yuya’s heart hammered in his chest as he tried to understand all of this. He was still dizzy from the drugs, and he could barely wrap his mind around it all. What did it all mean? What was it for? Was Kurosaki telling the truth? Who were these guys and why were they trying to get him?

A thought struck him. His heart plummeted into his chest.

“Kurosaki,” he said.

“What?”

“You said that you think they’re targeting the girls too, right?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“And you think Selena’s involved?”

“She’s got to be.”

Yuya’s heart screamed in his chest. He didn’t want to — he could hardly bring himself to suspect Selena of all people — 

“Well Yuzu is — she’s alone at her dorm with Selena  _ right now _ .”

It seemed to dawn on Kurosaki all at once, eyes widening. He swore as he shot to his feet and ran towards the couch. Yuya leaped to his feet and ran after him, fumbling in his pocket for his phone. 

Regardless of Kurosaki’s opinions on the police, he dialed emergency services.


	4. Chapter 4

Yuya nestled his head between his knees and tried to fend off the headache that was threatening to come down on him as quickly as the storm from last night. Luckily, the rain had stopped, though everything was coated with a thick layer of water, making the air feel sticky.

A copse of cops hovered outside Yuzu’s dormitory, while most of the dorm’s inhabitants were now outside, milling about while they weren’t talking to police, though no one was allowed to leave the scene that was now corralled in with caution tape. 

Yuzu hadn’t been in her room, but her cell phone had been found on the floor in the lounge, along with a spilled mug of tea which the police had taken to be tested for drugs. The string of messages that Yuya had received from Yuzu checking in on him glowed on his screen where the phone dangled from his hand — it had been those, with the timestamps, that had convinced the officer who’d arrived first to call in a few more people. Yuya had nearly cried when the officer had told him he believed him that Yuzu hadn’t just left on her own — all of his talking with Kurosaki had gotten him really worked up that they wouldn’t believe him.

For his own part, Yuya had already had to explain his own assault and Kurosaki’s part in rescuing him to about five different people. He’d heard Kurosaki shouting at another officer without hearing the full context — luckily, however, he hadn’t gotten physical, and had finally calmed down, stalking away to hover at the edge of the scene and wait. 

People Yuya sort of knew through Yuzu from the dorm kept trying to come over to him and ask him what was going on. Luckily, though, the RA had been done talking to the police by then, and she’d run over to shoo them away.

“That’s enough! Go back to your dorms, everyone! If the police need to talk to you, I’ll come and find you!! Don’t you all have homework to do?”

She huffed, putting a hand on her hips as a disappointed group of students reluctantly filtered away. She turned to Yuya, then, and settled herself on the step beside him. He glanced up as she did so, and found a styrofoam cup of something warm hovering front of him. He glanced up at her — he didn’t know her that well, but Yuzu had always said she was a good RA. He couldn’t remember her name though. Haley? Or was it just Hale?

“Go on,” she said, jiggling the cup towards him. “You should get some fluids.”

“Thanks,” he mumbled, but his head felt so dead he wasn’t sure if she believed him.

He took the cup and proceeded to just stare at it. 

Yuzu was  _ gone _ . What was he going to do now? Was this his fault? If he hadn’t been knocked out for so long, or if Kurosaki had called the police...

“Chin up, okay? They’ll find her,” the RA said, squeezing his shoulder.

Another officer called for her, and she gave him one more quick pat before scurrying off. Yuya continued to stare at his cup. The heat and scent of the hot cocoa washed over him, but for perhaps the first time in his life, he wasn’t feeling like drinking hot cocoa.

He looked up when he heard someone stomping through the wet grass, and Kurosaki reappeared. He looked angry, his arms folded tightly across his chest, and he didn’t sit down, but he did stand over Yuya in a way that made Yuya feel simultaneously threatened, and like Kurosaki was attempting to shield him.

“Bastards,” he said. “They won’t  _ listen _ .”

“What are you trying to tell them?” Yuya said.

“That this is connected to those other cases! If they’d just look at all of them as though they were connected, they might find out what happened! But they’re totally useless! They won’t listen!”

Kurosaki let out a low, strangled sound, and Yuya stared at his hot cocoa again. The weirdness of this entire situation was really just starting to sink in. He  _ still _ didn’t know Kurosaki, or what to make of him and his theories about what was going on — well, for as far as his theories went. What could the mysterious kidnappers be doing, kidnapping a bunch of people who looked kind of similar? What for? Yuya couldn’t even begin to comprehend it. And now, Yuzu was...when just a few hours ago, the two of them had been talking, had been trying to outrun the rain...

He let his head drop between his knees again, now trying to fight back tears. His hands shook around his cup of hot cocoa.

“Yuya?”

The voice startled him, and his head shot up. Kurosaki tensed beside him, half moving in front of Yuya. Yuya, however, shot up to his feet, putting down the cup on the stairs.

“Reiji??” he said. “What are you doing here?”

Reiji looked as confused as Yuya felt, his eyes flickering across the scene. His jaw tightened and some of the color drained from his face at the sight of the officers and the caution tape. He glanced briefly over Kurosaki, frowning at him, before choosing to focus his attention on Yuya.

“Selena texted me and told me to meet her here,” Reiji said. “But what’s all this? What’s going on?”

Yuya’s eyes widened. Selena? Selena had asked Reiji to meet here? But why? And how long ago? Selena was gone, and she probably had taken Yuzu, and — 

Kurosaki shoved forward at that, before Yuya could respond, pushing Yuya behind him.

“Are you working with her?” he snapped, eyes flashing. “Where’s my sister?”

“Kurosaki, hang on!” Yuya said, tugging at his shirt.

Reiji didn’t flinch, his eyes narrowing as he met Kurosaki’s gaze full on.

“Assumptions and conclusions are rarely of any use to anyone,” he said tersely. “Perhaps you can start by explaining to me who you are, and what you are doing with Yuya.”

“Trying to make sure bastards like you don’t get your grubby hands on another innocent person, that’s what!”

“Guys!!” Yuya said. He wheeled around Kurosaki, grabbing his arm and Reiji’s and squeezing. It got their attention, and both of them looked down at him. Yuya took just a second to get his breath back, and then turned to Reiji. “Yuzu’s gone. We think she might have been kidnapped by — by Selena, maybe, and the gas station kidnapping is probably connected, and — I almost got taken by someone else, but Kurosaki saved me. He’s trying to find the people we think took Yuzu. They might have taken his friend and sister.”

He looked at Kurosaki, then.

“Reiji is — he’s my friend, from the theater club,” he said quickly. “He knows Selena because she was in it too, that’s all. They’re acquaintances.”

Reiji’s face tightened at Yuya’s explanation, and his fist clenched around the phone in his other hand. Kurosaki didn’t look in the least convinced, shooting daggers of a glare at Reiji.

“That doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “Celina, or Selena, or whoever the fuck she is, she was our friend, too. He could be working with her.”

He yanked his arm out of Yuya’s grip and advanced on Reiji.

“Why did she text you at nearly fucking midnight? And after she already disappeared with her target? That’s pretty suspicious. Why were you going to meet her in the middle of the night?”

“Will you  _ keep your voice down _ ?”

The edge in Reiji’s voice cracked like a whip, and even Kurosaki blinked with surprise. Yuya’s eyes widened — he was pretty sure he’d never heard Reiji sound like that before. He was always so soft spoken.

Reiji fixed his glasses, lips tight. His eyes shot over to the copse of police officers.

“ _ This _ is the text I received, if you would like to examine it,” he said, turning his phone up towards the pair of them.

Yuya leaned forward. Kurosaki sort of pushed him mostly out of the way almost without seeming to realize it, but Yuya was able to get a look at the screen.

There was a photo — a spilled mug of tea on a table, and...and something drawn on the table with the liquid. It was sort of a circle, with sharp, abstract diagonal lines inside of it that sort of reminded Yuya of a wide wingspan of a bird, or a bat. Beneath the photo was a single sentence.

_ Better hurry up if you want to learn the truth. _

Yuya shivered. His eyes lifted up to Reiji. 

“What does this mean?” he said.

Reiji shot another glance at the police. His jaw tightened. 

“I think we should find a more private place to have this conversation.”

“Oh really? So you can lure your target away again, huh?” Kurosaki said. “What does that bullshit even mean? The truth? What are you planning?”

“Because,” Reiji said, and then his voice cracked, and he had to take a moment to take a breath. When he spoke next, his gaze was sharp, and...pained. “Because I believe whoever took Hiragi-san is the same group responsible for killing my sister.”

* * *

They managed to slip inside the dormitory, which had been cleared of most students. The police were still discussing things amongst themselves, and when Kurosaki had demanded that Yuya be allowed to go inside and rest, they’d agreed that was the best place for him right now.

So, now here they sat, the three of them facing each other in a tense silence in a darkened dorm lounge.

Reiji glanced out the window behind him, and then turned forwards, folding his hands on top of the table.

“Forgive me for not wanting to speak openly,” he said. “I’m afraid I don’t particularly trust the police.”

Kurosaki let out a soft grunt that might have been agreement, and Yuya hid an exhausted, almost giddy sort of smile. He was starting to lose it from the stress. 

The silence dragged out for a few more difficult seconds.

“You...you have a sister?” Yuya finally asked.

“Had,” Reiji said, and Yuya winced. Reiji didn’t seem to notice, however. “She went missing around six years ago. She was found dead three months later, her body discarded in a ditch in the forest.”

Yuya shuddered deeply. Even Kurosaki looked a little uneasy, his hands tightening against his arms.

“And you think that has something to do with this,” he said.

“I don’t think — I’m quite positive,” Reiji said. He fished out his phone again, flicking to another screen. He slid the phone across the table to the pair of them, and they both leaned forward.

Yuya shivered again when he saw the same symbol they’d seen drawn with the spilled tea — only this one was more carefully, technically drawn.

“What is this?” Kurosaki asked.

“It’s a marking that was found carved into my sister’s skin,” Reiji said. “Likely done  _ before  _ her throat was cut, according to the autopsy.”

Kurosaki flinched. Yuya felt bile rising up in his throat as awful images raced through his mind, and he couldn’t help but superimpose Yuzu into the terrible images. He pressed a hand to his mouth to stop himself from throwing up.

Reiji recited the fact rather impassively, as though he were simply reading from a script. But Yuya noticed the way his hands began to shake against the table.

“What the fuck,” was all Kurosaki could get out. Then his face whitened. “My sister —”

“Is likely currently alive,” Reiji said. “Judging by my calculations.”

Reiji continued talking, like an automaton.

“Last time, my sister was the only one to disappear — though my father went missing a month and a half after that. He was found at the same time my sister was, half-dead and having lost his mind. He’s been in the hospital since.”

His voice halted, and for a moment, he didn’t say anything. Yuya could hardly think. Reiji had been...all this time, Reiji had had this hanging over him? Ever since Yuya had met him? He could hardly imagine.

“At least, until two days ago,” Reiji said, voice cracking. “When he disappeared from the hospital on his own, leaving behind only a note saying he was going to find his revenge.”

Yuya tensed. Kurosaki sucked in a long breath.

“You think whoever killed your sister is going to do it again, don’t you?” Kurosaki said. “How much do you  _ really _ know? What are they trying to do? Why is it more than one person disappearing this time?”

A flash of annoyance passed over Reiji’s eyes at Kurosaki’s rapid fire questions. Before he could answer, however, Yuya leaned forward, his heart thrumming. Reiji’s eyes flickered to his. For a moment, they only stared at each other. Then Yuya forced his throat to crack open so he could speak.

“What’s going on, Reiji?” he asked.

Reiji’s lips parted. Then his eyes softened, and his shoulders slumped forward. He reached up and pulled off his glasses, rubbing at his eyes.

“I don’t know,” he finally said.

He replaced his glasses.

“I’ve tried to research them for almost six years — I have more than enough money, connections,  _ and _ access to technology through my father’s company to track these... _ monsters _ down, and yet they keep slipping out of my grasp.”

He gestured down at the symbol on his phone.

“This is the only concrete information I’ve been able to track down.”

“What is it?” Kurosaki asked.

“It is the sigil of Zarc,” Reiji said, “the mark of — supposedly — an incredibly powerful demon with the power to bring about the apocalypse.”

For a moment, there was dead silence. Then Kurosaki let out a thin, choked laugh.

“Oh my god,” he said, leaning back in his chair, arms sliding to his sides. “You’re joking. A cult? This is some demon cult  _ bullshit _ ?”

“Is that so difficult to believe?” Reiji said testily. “Now, I do not necessarily  _ believe _ in spirits and demons, but cults? Cults exist. And they can and do perform acts that seem like  _ madness _ to outsiders.”

Yuya started to shake. He couldn’t stop trembling. His mind was full of awful images — the description of Reiji’s sister’s death, the horrifying concept that  _ Yuzu _ was now in these strangers’ clutches — he could hardly breathe. 

“You’re coming in here with all of this random bullshit all of a sudden, ready to explain everything, and you don’t think I’m not gonna find that suspicious?” Kurosaki said.

“You’re willing to believe there’s a connection between several mysterious  _ possible _ kidnappings, but you’re not willing to believe that a cult might be the exact type of people to perform such a peculiar spat of kidnappings?”

That got Kurosaki to hesitate.

“But if they only took... _ one _ person the last time, then what about this time? This is...six people they’re going after.”

“Seven,” Reiji said. “Through no fault of your own, you missed one disappearance.”

He flipped through his phone again, and showed them the screen. Yet another face, eerily similar to Yuya’s own, looked out from it. His hair, however, was slicked back, a deep purple and magenta, and a pair of glasses rested before his sharp magenta eyes.

“Who is this?” Yuya asked.

“He is the reason I began to suspect the cult was active again, before this,” Reiji said. “His name is Yuki Yuuri. He was an intern at the botany lab on the other side of town — one day, he stopped coming into work.”

Yuya felt a crawly feeling run down his arms. That was...three, now, not including him. Three boys who looked like him, all targets. And three girls outside of Selena.

“I only noticed him because I happened to see his face in the paper, and his similarity to Yuya struck me,” Reiji said. “I...borrowed the police report on his disappearance.”

Kurosaki snorted. Reiji passed the phone over to him first, raising an eyebrow at him as though daring him to speak his mind. Kurosaki didn’t say anything, just reading over the file that Reiji had brought up on his phone. He frowned when he got to the bottom, and Yuya’s heart quickened.

“The same symbol?” Kurosaki.

“It was the only thing they found out of place in his room,” Reiji said. “Everything else was exactly put back where it should be — save for a scrap of fabric with the sigil on it, tucked in a notebook.”

“Did he leave it as a message?” Yuya said.

“I can’t be sure. But perhaps he managed to rip the symbol from the clothing of his attackers, and had enough presence of mind to hide it as a message. Either that, or he may have been a member himself, and simply went with them. I don’t know. The theories could be endless if we follow them all day.”

“Whatever,” Kurosaki said, throwing the phone back onto the table. “This is all stupid — who cares who they are? What  _ I _ want to know is how to find them, and to get my sister and best friend back!”

“And Yuzu,” Yuya said, his voice cracking. “Reiji, how do we...do you know how to find them?”

Reiji’s jaw tightened. He let out a long sigh, leaning forward to retrieve his phone.

“I’ve been trying to answer that question for  _ years _ . I’m not the slightest bit closer to finding out the truth — all I’m positive is...”

He flicked his eyes toward the window, and then back.

“I think there may be some of their number among the police,” he said tensely. “There are...there are so many holes in all of these cases. Such a refusal to treat them as connected. And back when my sister...something does not add up. I’m afraid to trust them.”

“Well, we agree on something,” Kurosaki grunted. “But that doesn’t change anything. We have to find a way to track them down ourselves.”

“Oh, please, do tell me your suggestions. You seem to have made excellent headway so far.”

“You’ve been at this for six years with all the tech papa can buy and you’re not any closer than I am!”

Yuya gripped at his head, trying to tune out their arguing. He couldn’t stop thinking about — about Yuzu. About the faces of the boys and the girls who were also missing. About the hand on his mouth, and the needle in his neck, and the  _ panic _ . He had no idea what was going on, or why — all he knew was that...people were gone, and they might be dying, and he didn’t know what to — 

He sucked in a breath.

A terrible, crazy idea sprouted in his head.

“Guys,” he said. “Guys!”

The pair of them stopped arguing, breaking to meet Yuya’s gaze. Reiji frowned, and Kurosaki glowered. Yuya took a deep breath, and leaned forward.

“I know how we can find them,” he said.

Reiji frowned deeper, brow furrowing.

“What are you talking about?” Kurosaki said.

“We already know what they want,” Yuya said. “They want me.”

He took a deep breath.

“What if we just let them have me?


	5. Chapter 5

Yuya downed the hot cocoa like a shot as the cop pushed through the doors. He put his cup down, and the cop glanced over the group of them. He frowned when he saw Reiji and Kurosaki.

“I’m going to have to ask you boys to step outside for a bit,” he said. “We’ll need to get some more testimony from the two of you, and we’ll need to speak to Sakaki-kun.”

“Can’t they stay?” Yuya said. “I mean...I’m sorry, I’m just really shaken up...”

“Yeah, why can’t you talk to us all at once?” Kurosaki said.

Yuya tried not to wince at the accusatory tone in Kurosaki’s voice.

But the cop only briefly glowered at Kurosaki.

“You in particular we need to talk to,” he said. “We’ve heard about you from the Heartland precinct. Funny business you ended up here in the middle of this.”

“Oh, yeah?” Kurosaki said. “Maybe if you’d do your  _ job _ , I wouldn’t  _ have  _ to.”

Reiji put a hand on Kurosaki’s shoulder briefly, as easily as though they had known each other for a lot longer than about thirty minutes.

“Yuya probably needs some time to rest anyway,” he said. “Our apologies, sir, we’re only very worried about our friend and wanted to make sure he was all right.”

Reiji should be on the acting side of things in theater, Yuya thought. He wasn’t too bad.

Kurosaki made a show of glowering at Reiji, and then stood with Reiji. He caught Yuya’s eye for just a minute, and Yuya saw the tightness of his jaw, the nerves in the shake of his fists.

_ This is going to work _ , he tried to impress silently. 

Whether or not Kurosaki got the message, Yuya had no idea. But he let Reiji lead the way out of the dorm. The cop followed them out. A few minutes later, a harried looking female cop bustled in. She took his story down for probably the sixth time, and then explained to him in detail what they could do in order to secure his safety while they investigated. Yuya tried to pretend to listen, at the very least — even though he knew his goal was to get himself kidnapped again.

_ How long before they make another move? _ he kept thinking.  _ Or what if they don’t? What if they decide I’m too much trouble, and they don’t come after me again? What if... _

The cop repeated a question he hadn’t heard, and he mumbled out an answer. Her face softened at that.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re still shaken up, aren’t you, hun? I shouldn’t be overloading you with all this right now.”

“N-no, it’s okay,” Yuya mumbled. “I just hope my friend is okay.”

She smiled, squeezing his arm.

“Well, don’t you worry about a thing, all right? We’re going to work as hard as we can to find your friend and bring her back home safe. We’re going to make sure you’re taken care of too, all right? You just trust us, okay hun?”

Yuya nodded blankly, his mind still far, far away. She clucked her tongue softly, and then noticed his empty cup.

“Do you need any more water, hun? Or anything else?”

“Um...water would be good, I guess.”

She smiled and took his cup as she stood, taking it over to the water dispenser at the other end of the lounge. Yuya drummed his fingers nervously against his knees. Maybe this was crazy. Maybe this was stupid! Maybe it wasn’t going to work, or he was just making a stupid, reckless mistake, maybe he  _ should _ just trust the police to do their job...

His mind ran on autopilot as he accepted the cup from the officer and downed it all at once. He hadn’t realized how thirsty he was before just now. Maybe he should get another cup. Try to settle himself a bit.

He started to stand up, and his legs gave out, dropping him back into the seat. He blinked. What...why were his legs so weak all of a sudden?

“Careful, hun,” the officer said. “We wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.”

“I must be just tired,” he mumbled.

But when he tried to stand again, he couldn’t force any strength into his legs. His hands shook, and the cup dropped from his fingers. The feeling was all too familiar.

His eyes widened as he felt himself begin to slide back in his chair like his body had turned to jelly, and the officer only smiled passively at him from across the table.

_ Oh, _ Yuya thought.  _ Well, you were both right about the police, Kurosaki, Reiji. _

His eyes fluttered shut as the drugs overtook his body.

_ That didn’t take long at all. _

* * *

It took Reiji much longer than he would have liked, and a few too many quiet references to his societal position, to get himself away from the police. Once they began questioning some of the other students with dorms closest to the lounge where Hiragi had disappeared, he finally had a moment to slip to the side and check his phone. He pulled up the GPS tracker software that he’d engineered himself, flicking through to the map.

_ This is absolutely mad _ , he thought as he stared at the little blinking dot that marked Yuya.  _ I can’t — why did I let him talk me into this? _

The dot showed that Yuya was still inside the dorm, however, so he wasn’t ready to worry yet. He looked up at the sight of Kurosaki slouching towards him, shooting a glare over his shoulder at the police.

“Well?” he said.

Reiji raised his eyebrows at him, sending a pointed look at the police. They couldn’t talk freely out here — Reiji was already worried he’d potentially said too much in the dorm. And he wasn’t particularly sure of whether to trust this mysterious Kurosaki yet. It all seemed too convenient, that he would stumble across Yuya and come to the conclusion he did.

Kurosaki glared at Reiji as though he could tell what he was thinking, but he didn’t say anything. He just turned to stand near him, keeping an eye on both him and the police. Reiji let out a soft breath — it seemed Kurosaki trusted Reiji about as much as Reiji trusted him.

He looked down at his phone again, replaying the conversation over in his mind.

_ “What the hell are you talking about?” Kurosaki said. _

_“I’m saying you’ve got _me_. The perfect bait,”_ _Yuya said. “All we have to do is wait for them to try and grab me again, and this time, you let them — and follow them back to their hideout.”_

_ “That will put you in  _ immense _ danger,” Reiji said, shaking his head. “Absolutely not.” _

_ “What else do you want to do?” Yuya said, throwing his hands in the air. “Wait for the police to find Yuzu after she’s already dead??” _

_ He seemed to regret the words as soon as he said them, and Reiji shuddered in spite of himself as the image of his sister’s autopsy report flashed over his mind again. _

_ “What if we can’t keep up with them?” Kurosaki said. “Or what if they catch on that we’re following, and lead us somewhere else?” _

_ “You can — I don’t know, track me with my phone or something!” _

_ “They’ll take your phone, and — and I don’t even think that works! This isn’t a movie!” _

_ A thought occurred to Reiji, but...but no. He couldn’t suggest it. Absolutely not. _

_ “A tracker...would work,” slipped out of him before he could stop himself. _

_ Yuya leaned forward so quickly that Reiji flinched. His eyes locked onto Reiji’s with such force that it took the breath out of his lungs. _

_ “You have an idea,” he said. “Don’t you?” _

_ Reiji swallowed. He fixed his glasses. _

_ “I...there’s a small tracker inside my phone case,” he said. “I use it to locate my phone when I can’t remember where I’ve left it.” _

_ “And how is he supposed to wear a tracker?” Kurosaki said. _

_ “I’ll swallow it,” Yuya said. _

_ “Yuya, this is...this is dangerous, you can’t —” _

_ There was such a ferocity in Yuya’s eyes when he cut Reiji off that it once again took the breath out of him. _

_ “Give me the tracker, Reiji.” _

_ And despite himself, Reiji had. _

He groaned, pressing his head against his phone. This was so.... _ stupid _ . He couldn’t possibly be leaving this up to this crazy plan. After six years of research, he couldn’t be making this kind of gamble.

As soon as Yuya was done being interviewed, he was going to go in there and tell him that the plan was off. He couldn’t....he couldn’t put Yuya in danger like this. He couldn’t bring innocent people into his own vague scheme for....for what? Revenge? Justice? He didn’t even know.

His phone beeped softly, and he quickly looked down at it. He inhaled sharply.

_ That was — that was too fast. _

“What? What was that sound for?” Kurosaki asked, shooting a glance at him.

Reiji turned the phone towards him, and the pair of them both stared at the little yellow dot moving out of the back of the dorm, and towards the parking lot. They exchanged a glance.

“I have a car,” Reiji said.

“What the hell are we waiting for?”

* * *

Yuzu woke to the taste of dust coating her tongue and immediately choked on it. She hacked up half a lung, convulsing against the cold floor, before she could even think to figure out where she was.

“Hey! Hey, breathe! Take some deep breaths!”

The voice cut through the haze of coughs, and Yuzu finally shuddered to a stop, gasping and curling up on the floor. She groaned — her head hurt, and she could hardly see for the tears in her eyes from all of the coughing.

“You still alive?”

“Shh, let her breathe!”

Yuzu squinted through the pain of her headache and ran her dry tongue over her lips. She tried to get up, and found that her hands were...they were stuck. She couldn’t get them out from behind her. When she tried to twist at it, she felt her skin rubbing up against something cold and metal wrapped around her wrists a little too tightly. Something long jangled from the length of it as she managed to push her body up onto her knees, and she blinked away the last of the tears.

The first thing she saw was — well, what she  _ thought _ she saw, for a moment, was a mirror. But then the other girl smiled, and Yuzu wasn’t smiling, so there was no way that it could be a mirror — it was moving on its own.

“Are you feeling okay?” the girl asked.

Yuzu let out another dusty cough. One of her pigtails was coming undone, and she tried to fix it before she remembered her hands. She tugged at them, and found that they were bound up with a chain that was bolted to the wall behind her. Where — where  _ was _ she?

Yuzu whipped her head around, taking in her surroundings. The room wasn’t very big. It looked like a motel room, actually — an old, grimy motel room. There was an entertainment stand but no TV, and just one dusty bed with the same ugly comforter as every other terrible motel she’d been to. The windows were boarded up, leaving the room to a thin, dusty dimness.

The girl who’d been speaking to her was on the floor at the foot of the bed. Her long, dark hair fell in tangled knots against her back, and there was dust streaked over her face. There was another girl sitting on the bed at the other end, her knees curled up to her chest. Once again, Yuzu had the eerie feeling of looking into a mirror. This girl was stockier than Yuzu, though, and her short green hair poofed about her face. She looked a little dirty too, and her uniform shirt was torn near the waist.

Yuzu let out a last cough, and shifted onto her knees.

“Where am I?” she said. “And what’s going on?”

The dark-haired girl’s smile twitched, but she tried to keep it plastered on, almost as a soothing expression.

“My name is Kurosaki Ruri,” she said. “And this is Rin.”

She gestured to the other girl, who just let out a small huff.

“As for where we are,” Ruri said with a deep sigh. “I’m afraid I don’t know, either.”

Yuzu twisted her wrists against her chains, trying to see if she could jiggle them loose.

“Don’t bother,” Rin said, and Yuzu realized then that the girl was handcuffed to the bed posts. “I’ve been trying to work at these things for days.”

“Days?” Yuzu said, her voice cracking. “You’ve been here for  _ days _ ?”

“That’s nothing. Ruri’s been here for like. What? A month?”

Ruri ducked her head, and Yuzu finally realized that she was chained, too, handcuffed by her ankle to the foot of the bed. Yuzu’s head spun and she closed her eyes, trying to get her bearings. How had she even...

Selena.

Her eyes flew open.

“How did I get here?” she said. “Did someone bring me in?”

“Yeah, those cloaked bastards,” Rin said, yanking almost automatically at her handcuffs. “They tossed you in and left you here. Been waiting for you to wake up.”

“But...there was another girl,” Yuzu said. “She...”

Her heart clenched as she thought about it. Selena had...she’d  _ drugged _ Yuzu. Had she brought her here?

“What about Selena? Where did she go? Why did she —”

“Celina?” Ruri said, blinking. “Did you just say Celina?”

Yuzu’s lips parted. She shook her head, and Ruri looked disappointed.

“Was she a friend of yours? Did they take her too?” Rin asked.

“I...no, I think...I think  _ she’s _ the one who got me here,” Yuzu said. The words tore through her as she spoke them, and tears filled her eyes. Selena...how could Selena do this?? And why?

Ruri looked horrified, and she shifted slightly forward.

“This — this Selena,” she said. “Did she...did she look a little like...well, like us? Dark hair, green eyes? Yellow ribbon?”

Yuzu’s breath caught.

“That’s her,” Yuzu said. “You know her?”

Ruri looked stricken. She leaned back on her hands, face white. Rin just huffed.

“I told you,” she muttered. “Girl sold you out.”

“N-no, but she was taken with me and Yuto,” Ruri said, moaning softly. “I thought...she couldn’t have...”

Ruri crumpled forward on her knees, and Yuzu’s heart panged at the sadness that seemed to have overtaken her. Yuzu had no idea what was going on, or who these girls were, or anything. But Selena...had Selena really been the cause of this? And why?

“Do either of you know anything about where we are? Or why?” she begged.

Rin shrugged, and Ruri didn’t lift her head from her knees. Yuzu felt faint.

And then, all at once, she felt very, very  _ angry _ .

It seemed to hit her all at once, as though it were just settling in with her awareness of where she was and how she’d gotten here. Selena had drugged her. And because of that, she’d ended up here, and she had no idea what for.

“Hey,” she said. “Hey!”

Her voice, or perhaps the tone, caught both girls’ attentions, and they both looked at Yuzu with surprise. Yuzu shifted forward on her knees, her heart suddenly thrumming with determination.

“I know I just got here,” she said. “And I’m sure you’ve both tried ways of getting out of here. But if there’s one thing I hate more than anything, it’s  _ not having answers _ .”

Both girls stared at her, their lips parting almost in synch. Yuzu pushed her shoulders back.

“So we’re getting out of here,” she said. “Because I’m not dying before I know  _ why _ Selena did this.”

For a moment, neither girl spoke. Then Rin let out a laugh. She bent forward as far as she could with her cuffs to start giggling into her knees.

“Oh, I  _ like _ you,” she said, after she recovered. “Okay, new girl. Why don’t you tell us what you’ve got planned?”

Ruri bit her lip, looking nervous, but she didn’t take her eyes away from Yuzu. Yuzu hesitated for just a moment — for a moment, her bravado threatened to leave her, as she realized that she had no idea how she was going to make good on her promise.

However...slowly, a plan started to formulate in her mind. She turned her gaze to the other two.

“So,” she said. “What can you tell me about the kind of people that come in and out of this room?”


	6. Chapter 6

The long winding road went on for what seemed like forever, Akaba’s headlights only pushing the dark back a few feet ahead of the vehicle. On either side, the forest was thick and dark, and Shun could see little more than impressions of trees and stains of darkness that blotted out the stars. There was no moon, and it made his skin crawl in spite of himself.

To his left, Akaba sat at the wheel, staring out into the darkness — he was going only a little over forty miles per hour, and Shun chafed at the pace. 

“Can’t we go any faster?” he growled.

“I’d rather not get us into a wreck,” said Akaba, glancing down at his phone where it was slotted into a holder on the dashboard. The tracker signal from Yuya blinked softly, showing that he was a good mile ahead of them, and moving  _ much _ faster than Akaba was.

Shun growled, putting his elbow on the windowsill and his chin on his hand, staring out into the blur of shadows. Once, he thought he saw the lights flicker off of the eyes of an animal, but it was so quick he didn’t see it.

“I could drive this thing much faster,” said Shun.

“This is not a straight road,” Akaba said testily. “We’d end up in a tree, and then what would we do? Visibility is very low out here.”

“Turn your brights, then.”

“I don’t want them to know we’re following. Breathe, Kurosaki. Whatever happens, we’ll get there.”

“And everyone will be dead.”

Akaba’s lips tightened, and his knuckles went white where they gripped the steering wheel.

“No, they won’t.”

“And what makes you so sure?” Shun said, turning back to Akaba with narrowed eyes. “You know, I think it’s pretty suspicious, you showing up when you did. How much you know. Who’s to say you’re not working with them?”

“I’m sure because it took them almost three months to kill my sister,” Akaba said tightly. “She hadn’t been dead for more than four hours when the police found her. Whatever their plans are, I’m sure that they’re being cautious. They won’t act hastily.”

Shun grit his teeth, hating how  _ logical _ he made it all sound. But how much could Shun really trust him? He said he’d lost his sister to these bastards, and he  _ seemed _ genuine, but Shun had known great actors before. Celina — or Selena, or whatever she was actually called — was one of them. He’d thought she was their friend, for  _ months _ . He’d only known this Akaba for a few hours. He couldn’t believe he was letting this guy drive him wherever he wanted. For all Shun knew, he was taking him on a wild goose chase, and there  _ was _ no tracker — and Shun was about to become the next body left in a ditch in the woods.

_ Not if I can help it _ , Shun though, eying Akaba through the corner of his eye. 

“How come you know all about them, anyway?” he said. “And why did that girl send you a text? Did you know she was a part of them?”

“No, I didn’t,” said Akaba. “Not until I received that message.”

“That seems pretty suspicious. How did she even know you were researching them? And why would she have told you?”

“I don’t  _ know _ !” Akaba said, his voice ripping out of him as he smacked the steering wheel with both hands. “I have no idea! I was at the point of giving up my investigation entirely before my father suddenly left the hospital! And then all of this! I think it’s just a suspicious as you think it is!”

“All I’m saying is that of the two of us, yours is the hardest to believe,” Shun said, turning completely in his seat to face him. “Your brain-dead father managed to leave a hospital with no one noticing, and no one finding him?”

“I’m just as baffled as you are as to how that occured and I’ve already been looking into his whereabouts for weeks! Do you want me to stop here, pull over, and show you the police files on his disappearance??”

“And A cult member just  _ happens _ to text you and bring you here just in time?” Shun pushed on. “Where are you really taking us —”

The words caught in his throat when Akaba slammed on the brakes. Shun lurched forward. His seatbelt tightened just before he smashed his head against the dashboard. Tires screeched and the world tilted as Akaba spun the steering wheel, swerving off the road. He nearly hit a tree before he swerved back on, the car spinning to a stop sideways across the road. Exhaust fumed out of the back, billowing briefly through the air.

“What the  _ goddamn hell _ ?” Shun spat as he tried to get his bearings back.

Akaba fumbled with his seatbelt, slapping at it twice before he managed to get it off, and then practically threw himself out of the car. He scrambled around the side of the car and back across the dark road. It took Shun a moment to get his rattling brain settled, and then he processed what was going on. Shun had just accused Akaba of conspiring with the cult or kidnappers or whoever they were, and Akaba had nearly gotten them killed. Was he running away?

Shun fumbled with his own seatbelt, punching the door open and leaping onto the concrete. He ran after Akaba — but it turned out he didn’t need to go far.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” Akaba’s voice cut through the darkness, actually sounding — shaken.  _ Terrified _ . “ _ How _ did you — are you listening to me??”

It was so dark, but Shun started to adjust, with the lights of the car pouring into the woods behind him as his only light source. He approached slowly.

Akaba was on his knees, gripping tightly to the shoulders of someone who was barely as tall as Akaba was kneeling. The child was somewhat shapeless, though as Shun approached, he realized that was because of their baggy sweatshirt hanging from their shoulders and the hood pulled over their head. What the  _ hell _ ? What was a child doing — doing out here? In the middle of goddamn nowhere?

The child stood perfectly still as Akaba shook them slightly, his eyes wide with horror and panic behind his glasses.

“Reira!” he said, shaking them slightly. “Reira, are you  _ listening _ to me?”

Shun made it over to the pair of them, staring at them with his mouth hanging open, barely able to comprehend what was going on. Akaba had swerved off the road to avoid hitting this child and — and he seemed to know them.

The child, on their part, just stood there, staring with wide, eerie eyes, almost too big for their face, looking blank, like a doll. Akaba let out a thin, choking sound, before enveloping them in a tight hug.

“Akaba,” Shun said. “What the hell is going on?”

Akaba’s shoulders shook, face buried in the child’s shoulder. Could...could someone be  _ that _ good of an actor? Was this some convoluted means of....something? Shun couldn’t even begin to imagine how something this out of the blue could be used to benefit Akaba in any way.

Then suddenly, the child blinked. Their mouth opened, and a deep shudder ran through them. Something like recognition flooded their hollow eyes, and they seemed to realize they were being hugged. Their short arms wrapped tentatively around Akaba’s back.

“Niisama?” they said, their voice low and confused. “Where...where am I?”

Akaba let out another choked sound.

“You’re safe, it’s all right,” he said, pulling back and gripping their shoulders. “Do you know how you got here? Did you have another episode?”

Reira blinked, lips parting. Then another deep shudder ran through them, and their eyes bubbled with tears. They clamped their hands to their ears, pushing the fabric of their hood against them.

“Niisama,” they gasped. “Niisama, it’s so  _ loud _ .”

What was loud? Shun looked around, but the place was dead quiet. The only sound was the car humming softly. Hang on...

Shun’s skin suddenly crawled. Where were all of the normal night sounds? The night birds and insects, the animals in the trees? It was so quiet it was as though something had sucked the sound out of the air.

Akaba, however, tensed.

“We need to get out of here,” Akaba said, scooping Reira in his arms.

“What the hell is going on?” Shun asked.

“I have no idea, but we need to get in the car  _ now _ .”

There was no sound in the woods — and yet, suddenly, Shun felt a humming in his chest, like feeling rather than hearing the bass from the car next to you on a busy day, but from far, far away. He bolted after Akaba, climbing back into the passenger seat while Akaba quickly buckled the child into the back seat, and then bolted back around to the steering wheel.

“What’s going on? Who is that? Why are we —”

Akaba didn’t listen — he just threw the car back into gear, and the tires shrieked as he spun them back around and shot back the way they had come.

“What are you doing? Yuya’s that way!” Shun said.

“We’ll go back! I’m not taking my younger sibling with me to a cult base!” Akaba snapped.

His younger sibling?? But how the hell — 

Shun wanted to argue — he had no idea what was going on, or how this child had gotten here and why, and he couldn’t exactly argue with not wanting to bring a nine-ten year old on a mission to rescue people from a mad cult. But they didn’t have time for this! And why was this kid out here in the first place??

In the back seat, Reira curled up with their knees to their chest and their head to their legs, hands crunched against their head.

“It’s too late, niisama,” they mumbled. “We’re already here.”

Shun didn’t have a moment to interpret that, because suddenly, Akaba began to slow down again. 

“What now??” Shun said, swinging his head back to him.

Akaba only stared out the window, eyes wide and face white. Shun followed his gaze.

They had definitely turned around, Shun thought. They had  _ absolutely _ turned around.

And yet, where there should not be, there was a break in the trees, leading up to a cleared off hill. And at the top of the hill was a big, black square-ish building.

On Akaba’s phone screen, Yuya’s tracker blinked — much closer than it had been before.

“What the hell?” Shun swore.

Behind them, Reira let out a thin, nervous moan.

* * *

Yuya woke once again to the familiar feeling of a pounding headache and a dry mouth. What was  _ not _ familiar was the sound of someone swearing.

“You are — you are  _ pinching _ me, you’re making it  _ tighter _ you absolute  _ imbecile _ —”

“If you’d stop moving I could have us out! Stop moving!!”

“Guys  _ shut up _ , you’re going to get their attention!”

Yuya squinted, blinking his eyes to get the grogginess out of them. He tried to move, and found that his wrists were pinned behind his back in an uncomfortable position. He was propped up against something hard, and his hands appeared to be bound up behind it. It took him a few moments of shifting to realize that it was a table leg that was digging into his back. He blinked a few more times, and then his eyes adjusted to the room.

It appeared to be an old, dusty motel room, fallen into disrepair probably decades ago. The windows were boarded up and what remain of the curtains hung in wispy rags. There was a bed, but it had been turned on its side and pushed against the wall, leaving most of the room open, save for the table that he was tied to, an old lamp that wasn’t plugged in, and a couple of chairs.

Two of the chairs were back to back, and there were two wriggling shapes that appeared to be tied to them. The first boy’s glasses slipped down his nose, and he looked absolutely furious, flinching when the boy behind him tried to move again, moving both chairs.

“If I can just loosen this one a little more,” said the other boy, his blond and blue hair starting to fall out of his updo.

“You’re making too much noise!” came another voice, and Yuya turned to find a third boy tied to one of the other table legs. He sucked in a breath — he recognized that one!

“Yuto?” he said.

The boy’s head jerked towards him, eyes wide. His lips parted, staring at him for a long moment, and Yuya wondered if he was experiencing the same eerie feeling of looking into a face that looked so much like his. Then his brow furrowed.

“Do...how do you know my name?”

The other two boys stumbled fumbling around, looking at him. Or well, the boy with the swooped hair tried to look at him, but he was facing the other way, and craning his neck around seemed to be difficult.

Yuya swallowed through his dusty throat.

“I — I met your friend, Kurosaki,” he said.

Yuto’s eyes bulged, and his body sort of lurched forward.

“Shun?? You met Shun? Is he okay? What about Ruri? Have you seen Ruri?”

“Now who’s making too much noise,” said the boy with the glasses. Yuya thought he recognized his face, too — wasn’t that the intern, Yuuri, that Reiji said had also disappeared? And then the boy behind him, that must be the one from the gas station! Reiji had been right — everyone was here!

Well...not everyone, Yuya realized with a sinking feeling as he looked around the room and found no sign of Yuzu. The girls weren’t here.

He returned his attention to the others, shifting his already sore wrists.

“My name is Yuya,” he said. “And I — I’m sorry, I don’t know where Ruri is. My friend was taken too.”

“Mine too!!” the boy behind Yuuri said, shaking both of their chairs back and forth and making Yuuri scowl. “They took Rin! I have to get to her as soon as I can!!”

“Will you  _ stop moving _ ?” Yuuri hissed.

Yuto’s face fell, but he closed his eyes, taking in a deep breath.

“But Shun? Shun’s all right?” he said.

“He’s still looking for you,” Yuya said. “In fact, I...”

He stopped, sneaking a glance towards the door of the motel. It  _ sounded _ quiet, but there must be someone on guard out there. He lowered his voice.

“Is anyone listening to us?”

“Unlikely,” Yuuri said testily. “If they could hear how much  _ noise _ we’re making, they’d likely come in and give us another shock.”

Yuya shivered — a shock? He didn’t want to know the details of that.

“I’m bringing help,” he said.

“Looks like you’re doing an excellent job of it, tied to the table like that,” said Yuuri, and the other boy leaned back hard in his chair, making the pair of them nearly keel forward with Yuuri face first on the ground, before they resettled. “Stop  _ doing that _ !!!”

“Stop being rude!” said the other boy. “Let Yuya talk! I’m Yugo, by the way. Do you know how we can get out of here?? I need to find Rin right away!”

Yuuri swore under his breath, and Yuya tried to regain his train of thought.

“Listen,” he said, keep his voice low. “Kurosaki and my friend, Reiji, are on their way here.”

“Shun is?” Yuto said, sounding horrified. “He’s going to get himself killed!”

“And how are they going to find us?” Yuuri asked.

Yuya shifted again.

“I swallowed a GPS tracker,” he said. “My friend Reiji is going to use it to find us.”

“Are they bringing the police, at least?” Yuto asked hopefully.

Yuya winced, remembering the police office who had drugged him.

“Probably not.”

“What are two people supposed to do to get us out of this?” Yuuri said, lip curling. “This has to be the most ridiculous and  _ idiotic _ plan I’ve ever heard of.”

Something in Yuya deflated at Yuuri’s words. That...he had a point...what had he been  _ thinking _ ? That just Reiji and Kurosaki would be able to swoop in and save all of them? Had he just gotten the pair of them into more trouble than they could handle? He  _ was _ stupid — how had he thought this was a good idea??

He shifted his wrists behind him, and then hesitated. He shifted back against the table. It moved, slightly. It wasn’t bolted to the floor. He looked up.

“Hey, Yuto,” he said, turning to him. “Can you stand up?”

Yuto frowned, blinking with confusion.

“I mean, my legs are fine, if that’s what you’re asking,” he said. “But we can’t really stand up in this position...”

“Do you think we could get the table under our shoulders and lift it?”

Yuto frowned deeper.

“What for?”

Yuya twisted his wrists experimentally. Yes, they weren’t tied  _ to _ the table leg, they were tied  _ behind  _ it.

“If we could lift it enough for one of us to get our wrists out from under the leg,” he said, “We’d have more mobility.”

Yuto’s eyes alit with understanding. He looked at the table, and then behind him. He nodded slowly.

“That just might work,” he said.

“And  _ then _ what, geniuses?” Yuuri said.

Yugo shoved at his back again, and Yuuri let out a petulant, but quiet, hiss.

“If we can get our hands free, we’ll have way more options,” said Yuya. “And if we can get out of this room, we can make it harder for these guys to do...whatever it is they’re doing.”

He blinked as he realized he still had no idea why they were here. He thought about asking, but...he doubted they knew yet, either. Focus on getting out, and  _ then _ getting answers.

“Okay, on three,” he said to Yuto, getting his feet underneath him. “One...two...three!”

Yuto pushed upwards at the table, and Yuya did too, trying to catch the lip of it against his back. It was heavy!!

“O-okay, I’ve got it! Try to get your wrists out from under it!”

“Are you sure??” 

“Quickly!!”

Yuto didn’t hesitate again. He ducked down, and Yuya’s back screamed with the weight of the table against it. Yuto dropped back to a sitting position, and pulled himself forward by his legs, pushing with his hands behind him, until he — 

He did it!

Yuya let the table drop with a groan, trying not to let it crash loudly. Yuto sat where he was for a moment, eyes wide.

“Okay,” Yuya said. “Now see if you can roll onto your back and get your wrists in front of you by pulling your legs through. Then we’ll see what we can do from there.”


	7. Chapter 7

“You have done excellent work, my dear. You should be proud.”

Selena bowed, her bangs falling over her face. Roget tried to restrain his smile, but it was difficult. So quickly — they had retrieved each of their pieces so quickly, and with so little fuss. There had been a brief hiccup in retrieving the last potential vessel, but now he was here, safely locked away. He tapped his fingers over the small computer keyboard, the only glowing light in the whole room. 

This motel really was quite the dump, but it was the most practical location for them at the moment. Out of the way, difficult to find, no longer listed on any online records, and with plenty of space for constructing the proper circles. Not to mention, the location gave a perfect clear view of the stars and the dark moon, necessary for their purposes.

“How convenient for us,” he said, as he finished off making his last notations. “That all of the pieces were all collected so close to each other. I’m sure it made your job all that much easier, hm?”

“Our great Lord is so powerful as to be able to effect the world before his summoning,” Selena said, with a voice full of religious fervor. “I can only thank him for smoothing my path to aid in his resurrection.”

He tried not to chuckle. The poor thing had been practically raised in this cult, and she ate up every bit of it, hook, line, and sinker. It was almost sad, if it weren’t so utterly convenient for him. So devout that she was willing to make herself one of the sacrifices for tonight’s final, proper, summoning.

“I trust that you are prepared for tonight’s proceedings?” Roget asked.

“Yes, sir,” said Selena, still without lifting her head.

“Good. Our Lord will most certainly reward you for your loyalty.”

“I will be honored.”

He smiled. It was so good to be in charge, and to have such a willing bunch of fools to help him.

“We have much to do before the night ends,” he said. “Please see to it that the vessels are prepared.”

Selena bowed lower, and then turned, her ponytail swishing behind her. She marched towards the door, and disappeared through it. He stared for a moment at the place she had been, thinking.

Yes, much to do before midnight, when the ritual would finally be completed. He checked his watch. 10:35. Less than two hours until midnight. Years of careful work and study had gone into this — nothing at all like the slapdash work of the previous leadership. This cult was a farce, of course, to achieve the ultimate goal, but...

Well. Roget had seen a demon himself, once. He had seen what one could do before it had even been fully summoned. He  _ knew  _ they were real. 

And if this is what it took to get his hands on one...he would do whatever it took.

He turned his eyes to the computer screen once more, checking over his notes, the careful mathematics, steps, plans. Once he’d triple checked them, he would go and make sure the preparations for the circles and runes were finished correctly.

He looked up from his notes what he thought was several minutes later, and checked his watch again. Oh? Still two hours and fifteen minutes...that must not have taken as long as he’d thought.

He closed the laptop and tucked it under his arm, moving towards the door.

He didn’t seem to realize that his watch had simply stopped ticking.

* * *

Selena paused outside the door of Roget’s room, listening. Her bangs still hung low over her eyes, casting her into shadow.

She sucked in a long, shuddering breath, and lifted her head. For one moment, her head twitched. One of her eyes flickered, and for just a moment, perhaps as a trick of the light, it seemed to be completely black. 

But then she blinked, her head twitched almost involuntarily, and it was gone.

“Soon,” she whispered, to someone who wasn’t there — her voice was soft, and tense, almost a plea. “Don’t worry. Soon. Be patient.”

She stopped, listening to a response that didn’t arrive.

Then she stepped away from the door, and walked slowly towards the room where the vessels were kept.

* * *

Reiji parked the car in a small copse of trees where you couldn’t see the building, hoping that that would hide them from sight. His heart thrummed in his chest as he tried to comprehend what had just happened.

_ I turned around _ , he thought.  _ I  _ know  _ I turned around _ .

Perhaps the stress and the shock of finding Reira where they absolutely should not be had caused him to not actually turn around. But...he  _ knew _ he had turned around! He gripped the steering wheel so tightly he almost lost feeling in his fingers.

It was pitch black, as he’d turned off his car lights for fear of attracting attention. The only light came from the stars, and the dashboard clock reading 10:35 pm. Beside him, Kurosaki peered suspiciously into the darkness, towards where they had seen the building. He was little more than a shapeless blob in the dark. Reiji checked his rearview mirror, trying to see Reira. He could just make them out, curled up with their knees to their forehead and their hands over their ears. His heart shook.

“Okay,” Kurosaki hissed at Reiji. “What the hell is going on?”

Reira let out a tiny moan in the backseat, and Reiji wanted nothing more than to wheel his car around and drive as fast as he could to take them to safety.

_ I don’t think I can handle losing another sibling _ , he thought suddenly, feeling a tremble start in his chest.

He breathed in and out, slowly, trying to compose himself.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Reira...Reira should be at home.”

His voice cracked in spite of himself. This had shaken him far more than he would like to admit it had. For all his research and preparation to finally face down and destroy the monsters who had murdered his sister and all but taken his father from him...now that they were so close, he wasn’t ready.

“What’s wrong with...them?” Kurosaki asked, shooting an actually slightly concerned look into the backseat.

Reiji drew in another deep breath.

“After Ray died, Reira developed PTSD,” Reiji said softly, hoping Reira wouldn’t hear him. “They experience dissociative periods and hallucinations...episodes...every so often.”

He snuck another worried glance at his younger sibling. They looked so small, in that moment, like the eight year old they had been when they’d first learned of Ray’s death. Reiji had tried so  _ hard _ to shield them from the details, but the stress, fear, and agonizing loss had done its number on them anyway.

“But how did they get here?” Kurosaki asked.

“I have no  _ idea _ ,” Reiji said. “They should be at home with mother.”

_ Not that mother had given Reira so much as a glance since Ray died... _

Still, the staff liked Reira, and they should have kept a closer eye on them. Not to mention Reiji couldn’t even begin to fathom how Reira had  _ walked _ here, a distance of something close to seventy miles from home.

Reira wasn’t likely to give Reiji much in the way of an answer in this state, either. He chafed — on one hand, Yuya and Yuzu and the others were all so close. On the other, he couldn’t leave Reira out here alone, and he or Kurosaki couldn’t go into the complex alone. His only thought was to try and drive back, drop Reira off somewhere safe, and then come back — but did they have the time to do that?

A horrible image of Yuya and Yuzu lying dead, bloody and broken, just like Ray had been in the police photographs, made bile rise in his throat.

“What the hell do we do?” Kurosaki hissed. “We can’t just leave — not when Yuto and the others are here.”

“I  _ know _ ,” Reiji said. “I’m trying to think.”

Who could he call? The police were out of the question. He wracked his brains for other contacts he might be able to call in for backup, people who wouldn’t be too far away to not get here in time. He pulled his phone from its holder, intending to flick to his contacts and see who he could bring in. When his thumb accidentally swiped across the screen, however, it pulled the map of his GPS tracker to the side.

And it didn’t load.

Reiji frowned. He moved the map again, back to where it had been before. The tracker was still transmitting, and the area around the building on the hill was still there. He tried to zoom out.

Nothing but blackness filled in the map around the building, a perfect circle closing them in. As though somehow, the world outside this one place didn’t exist. 

_ I  _ know _ I turned around _ , he thought with a slow shudder running through him.

He closed the app and opened up his contacts. He tried calling home. No signal. He tried tapping into his wifi hotspot. Nothing. He turned on the regular map app, instead of the GPS tracking version. If they were simply out of signal, the app should simply tell him to wait for a connection. But...no, it was loading! He dared to feel some relief, that his hotspot was starting to work again...

The map loaded only the perfect circle of the forest and the building on top of the hill. No matter how much he moved, zoomed out, or panned the map, nothing else loaded.

_ There is a scientific reasoning for this _ , he thought, though already he knew he wasn’t believing it.  _ There must be some kind of...some kind of jammer in place in this area. Yes, that would make sense. _

“Hey,” Kurosaki said in a low voice. “Don’t make any sudden moves, but I think I just saw something moving out there.”

Reiji lifted his head slowly, trying to peer through the darkness where Kurosaki’s head seemed to be tilted. As he did so, his glance caught on the dashboard clock again. 10:35 pm.

Had they only been discussing things for less than a minute? That couldn’t be possible. Instead of staring towards Kurosaki’s mysterious movement, he stared at the clock. Under his breath he counted the seconds. One. Two. Three. Four.

Fifty eight. Fifty nine. Sixty.

10:35 pm.

Reiji felt suddenly, very cold.

Time wasn’t moving.

_ Logic. Think logically. The clock must be dead. No, my phone clock says the same time. 10:35. Time can’t just  _ stop _ . _

“There’s definitely something out there,” Kurosaki said. “We should stay in the car, but get ready to ram it into something —”

They both froze when they heard the car door opening, and the sound of sneakers crackling onto the leafy ground outside.

Reiji smacked his seatbelt and flung himself out of the car, but Reira was already starting to  _ bolt _ through the darkness, towards the building.

“Reira!!” Reiji hissed, as loud as he dared. “Reira!! Get back here!”

But Reira wasn’t listening. Were they disassociating? Reiji ran faster, branches smacking at his face and roots catching at his shoes as he tried to keep sight of the moving shadow that must be Reira — running ever closer to the building on the hill.


	8. Chapter 8

“Help!” Yuzu screamed as loud as she could. “ _ Help! _ ”

Her voice was growing hoarse from yelling, and she wondered if there really  _ wasn’t  _ any guard on the door out there. The girls had insisted that there was a robed guard who came in and threatened to gag them if they didn’t stop making so much noise before, which meant someone had to be close enough to the door to hear.

“Help!!” she yelled again, and finally,  _ finally _ , she heard the sound of feet in the hallway, the stomp stomp stomp of someone running across an old wooden floor. The door jiggled, and then burst open.

Sure enough, a man in a robe with the hood pulled down over his eyes appeared — though, he pushed it back to reveal an older, middle-aged face and a beard that didn’t grow in properly when he saw the scene before him.

Ruri laid on the ground, looking suitably dazed and only half-conscious, her mouth lolling open and eyes half closed. Rin was in the middle of trying to knee herself in the forehead, only nearly being able to reach. 

“What in the  _ hells _ —” the man said.

“She rammed her head into the bed post!” Yuzu cried, putting on her best fake tears —  _ thank _ you, Masumi, for making her learn to do it on command for a role. “And she’s trying to hurt herself!! Please, do something!!”

The man swore. He seemed conflicted of where to go first, taking half a step towards Ruri’s “unconscious” form, and then towards Rin trying to knock herself out, and then finally started towards Rin. Yuzu’s heart thrummed in her throat. This could go so badly. This could go terribly! She was betting on so many things to go right!

But they didn’t have a choice, either! She had to try!

So as soon as he was just past Yuzu, with his back to her, she rolled onto her back, and kicked out with both legs as hard as she could.

She caught her heels right into the hollow of his knees, and he gasped as his legs went out from underneath him, his body keeling forward. He smacked into the bed — and Rin’s leg, already cocked back, snapped forward, striking him directly in the temple. He gasped and his body sagged in the other direction. Just in time for Ruri to come out of her “unconsciousness”, crank her own leg back, and kicked him right between the eyes.

He went down like a stone, falling right on the carpet inches from Ruri. 

“Quick! Before someone else comes after him!” Rin said.

Ruri had just enough chain to reach the man on the ground, crawling over to him and beginning to rifle through his pockets. Her face was so pale she looked like she might pass out, but she didn’t hesitate in any of her movements, throwing the man’s cloak back to get to his surprisingly regular shirt and jeans underneath.

“No keys,” she said, throat tight. “No — wait!”

She dug her hand into a pocket in the cloak, and came out triumphantly with a set of three small keys. 

“Hurry up!” said Rin.

Ruri fit each key one at a time into her cuff — the third one worked, and then she was leaping to her feet and rushing over to Rin. Yuzu peered around the corner towards the motel room door hanging open, her skin crawling. What if someone else came? And what was waiting for them out there? And her chest was still pounding with every thrum of her heart — she almost couldn’t believe that had  _ worked _ .

“Still clear,” she hissed back behind her, hoping that the keys were working on Rin’s cuffs. She heard some faint jangling, a soft swear, and a few more pointed obscenities with more jingling.

“Stupid fucking — how do these cuffs have  _ two _ separate keys?” Rin muttered. “A little more and...got it!”

Yuzu heard the sound of the last cuff springing open, and then Rin hitting the floor. Ruri appeared at Yuzu’s side then, crawling around to the back of her to try each key into Yuzu’s cuffs.

“They’re not working,” Ruri said, her voice shaking. “They don’t fit.”

Yuzu felt her heart rise in her throat. This guy didn’t have all of the keys? Oh,  _ god _ ...

“G-go without me,” she said, even though just the thought of being left alone in here was enough to make her feel dizzy. “Really!! We can’t slow down, if you go, you can bring back help!”

“Shut up! Give me those!” said Rin, pushing Ruri out of the way and snatching the keys. She yanked hard at the key ring, bending it out of shape, and then got behind Yuzu. Yuzu felt Rin fumbling with her hands, and then the sound of something slotting into the lock. It jangled behind her, Rin swore a few times, and then — 

Pop! The cuffs slid off of Yuzu’s hands, and she quickly wrapped her arms around herself, feeling short of breath.

“Still got it,” Rin said, with a self-satisfied sound. “I’m keeping this.”

She grabbed Yuzu under the arm and hauled her up to her suddenly shaking legs. Ruri clasped her hands in front of her, her face still pale and her whole body shaking.

“I can’t believe that worked,” she said, a high pitched giggle escaping her almost automatically. Her knees shook so much they almost clacked together.

Rin grabbed hold of Ruri’s arm, too, holding the two of them between her for a moment — Yuzu bit back a gasp at how tightly Rin gripped hold of her, and realized that was Rin’s way of shaking. Yuzu wasn’t sure if her own shock had caught up to her yet.

“Okay, genius,” Rin said, looking at Yuzu — though it sounded like a genuine compliment. “What now?”

Yuzu sucked in a steadying breath. Her mind felt suddenly sharp and clear — perhaps that was a trick of the shock, because despite that feeling, ideas seemed to dance away.

“We need to get out of here as quickly as possible,” she said.

“We can’t leave our friends,” Ruri said, horror tinging her voice.

“I know,” Yuzu said, her heart squeezing. If it had been Yuya who was kidnapped...she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stand it. “But it seems like they want us for something, and if they don’t  _ have _ us, they probably won’t hurt their other hostages.”

She managed to carefully extract herself from Rin’s grip and edge towards the door. She peeked out into the hallway, looking both ways. A long, raggedy motel hallway, complete with an eerie line of doors on each side, looked back at her, with dull gray light flickering from the ceiling. Several of the light fixtures were out, including the one at the left end of the hall, plunging that side into darkness. She shivered.

She pulled her head back from the door and turned to face her other two captives. Ruri’s pale face stared at her, shaking but listening. Rin had her arms folded over her chest, lips tight, but not saying anything. Yuzu’s heart rose in her throat as she realized, somehow, she had become in charge. She wasn’t sure she could handle the responsibility. She wasn’t even fully allowing her brain to catch up with what was happening around her, because she was sure if she did, she would break down.

“I want to make sure your friends are safe too,” she said. “But we have no idea where we are, or what we’re up against. If we start checking every room looking for them, we put ourselves in danger — and we can’t help them if we’re caught again.”

Ruri twined her fingers together. Rin tightened her stance. She looked like she wanted to argue.

“If we find them on our way looking for an exit, we’ll do everything we can to rescue them, too,” Yuzu said, before either of them could speak. “We don’t even know for sure that they’re in the same building.”

“You...have a point,” Ruri said softly.

Rin spat on the ground, but she shook her head.

“Fine,” she said. “But no offense to you two? If I see Yugo, I’m grabbing him and leaving you guys. I’m only sticking with you for now because it seems smarter than to strike out alone.”

She sounded like she was trying to sound tough, but her voice cracked. Yuzu just smiled and nodded her understanding. She took another look at the motel, looking both ways. Both of them looked as good as any other, and she had no idea how she was oriented, or even  _ where _ this motel was. One way was as good as any. She went right, towards the end with more light. At least she’d like to be able to see where she was going. Ruri and Rin followed. Rin closed the door behind them, carefully, and locked it with one of the keys from the keyring, leaving their guard locked in their former prison.

Yuzu moved slowly, keeping her eyes on the doors, and behind her, and at the end of the hall. She walked carefully, too, noting how the old carpet was wearing away to the wood underneath, and wary of it creaking. Her heart thumped so loudly in her ears that she wasn’t sure she’d even be able to hear if anyone else was coming.

_ Don’t think about how this feels like you’re living in a horror game. Don’t think about how this feels like you’re living in a horror game. _

She swallowed thickly, and edged around the corner of the first hallway.

It went off in two directions, and she hadn’t been able to tell until she’d reached it. Her heart sank as she looked both ways, and found that both hallways looked almost the same as the one they’d just come down. There was even a light out at the left end. There was no sign of which way to go — no placard on the wall indicating room numbers, or anything. Something tickled at her mind, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was. She sucked in a deep breath, and almost choked on the dust in the air. She had to figure something out regardless.

She looked up at the closest door near them, searching for a door number.  _ 417. _ She looked at the one on the other side of her.  _ 418 _ . She peeked around the hallway and looked at the nearest door number on the right side.  _ 308. _ Huh. That was a weird way to arrange the numbers. But 308 was lower than 418, which must mean it was closer to the exit.

“This way,” she said. “If we follow the door numbers down, we should be able to find the exit.”

“It’s as good a plan as any,” Rin said, though she didn’t sound very happy about it.

Yuzu stepped out into the hallway. Her foot creaked against the floor and she winced. She took another step. Another.

The floor crumbled under her feet, and it took everything she had not to scream as her body lurched out from under her. Ruri did not manage to conceal her scream. She made a wild swipe for Yuzu, snatching against one wrist. Then Yuzu’s fall abruptly stopped and pain lanced up through her body. She gasped out a choked sound rather than scream.

“Holy fuck,” Rin swore. “What the hell is wrong with this place?”

Yuzu’s spinning head took a moment to register what was going on. Her leg was...it was straight through the floor. Her other leg, though, was still on solid ground — though judging by the creaking, perhaps not for long. It had given way under just one foot, and now she...she might be stuck. She sucked in measured breaths as she tried to assess the damage. Her whole leg was through the floor, dangling in nothing, and her other had hit the ground pretty hard, scraping her knee. She tried to shift, and the floor creaked underneath her, so she stopped.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” Ruri kept mumbling over and over, clinging to Yuzu’s wrist.

“ _ Shit _ ,” said Rin. She edged around Yuzu, keeping to the wall and trying to avoid the places that seemed the most damaged. Yuzu’s brain was catching up with her, and more pain dug into her — she gasped as she realized the crumbled wood was digging into her leg, and she might have twisted her ankle, maybe.

Rin managed to get around the front of her, testing the floor for weakness. She held out her hands.

“Are you okay?” Rin asked.

Yuzu swallowed through a dusty throat, considering the question.

“I...I think I might be slightly in shock,” she said.

Rin grimaced, but she nodded.

“Okay, slowly,” she said. “Ruri, help me lift her out.”

Ruri edged forward from behind her, letting go of her wrist to slide her arms under Yuzu’s arms, while Rin got her from the back. With some effort, they pulled. After a beat, Yuzu came back to herself, and got her other leg underneath her, helping to push herself up. She yelped when the wood scraped against her leg as they managed to pop it out of the hole in the floor. Her shoe got caught, and before she could do anything, it was yanked off as the rest of her came out of the hole.

Distantly, Yuzu listened for the sound of the shoe dropping below.

Somehow, she didn’t hear anything at all. Maybe it was just her head thrumming.

Rin and Ruri dragged her to the side of the wall.

“Stay close to the sides,” Rin ordered. “It should be a little more stable near the walls.”

“Oh my god,” Ruri said, pressing her face into her hands. “I can’t take this.”

“You have to!” Rin said, perhaps a little more harshly than she should have. “We don’t have a choice!”

Yuzu shook herself, and snapped back enough to realize she needed to check for damage. She winced, poking at her ankle. Luckily, however, it didn’t seem to be too bad at all. She tested putting a bit of weight onto it, and it didn’t give out. She let out a breath of relief.

“God,” Rin swore. “Who decided to put their base of operations here?”

“I have no idea,” Yuzu mumbled. She shook her head. “Let’s — keep moving. Someone might have heard us.”

“In fact, someone did.”

Ruri clapped her hands to her mouth, and Rin threw herself to her feet, putting up her fists. From around the corner, a tall, broad man in a dark cloak like their guard had appeared, two other smaller cloaked figures behind him. He tutted softly.

“The lambs thought they could escape, did they?” he said. “How cute.”

Rin lunged forward, fists already flying, despite Yuzu screaming for her to stop. They couldn’t fight!! They had to run!!

But before Rin could even reach them, a whirlwind of dark hair flashed in front of her. The tall man let out an  _ urkkk _ , and Ruri’s leg cranked back for another strike between his legs.

“ _ GO!” _ she shrieked behind her, landing a second hit while the tall man bowed forward, and the other two tried to get around him.

Yuzu leaped to her feet, snatched Rin’s hand, and obeyed. Rin swore, but she didn’t argue. The pair of them bolted down the hallway. Yuzu’s gait was uneven, with one shoe and one sock, causing her to stumble — but she kept her footing, shooting for the other end of the hallway. 

Before they made it, however, Rin suddenly stopped dead, causing Yuzu to stop so abruptly that she careened backwards into Rin like a ricochet. 

“Ruri!” Rin shrieked, and Yuzu whipped around.

Oh god. Ruri hadn’t run with them — Yuzu had thought she was right behind them! 

But at the other end of the hall, two of the cloaked figures were pinning Ruri’s hands to her sides, even as she lunged and struggled. Rin started to lean in her direction, and Yuzu knew she was about to go back — in that split second, Yuzu truly did not know if she was going to try and keep Rin from doing so, or if she was going to run after Ruri too.

Ruri swung her whole head to the side, cracking it against the head of one of the figures holding her, and as soon as her hand was free, she whipped around and grabbed between the legs of the other and twisted. Her hair whirled around her in a tornado, a fire sparking in her eyes unlike the shaking girl she’d been just moments ago. She leaped backwards, out of the grip of the swiping man, but she danced back to the other hallway. Her eyes caught on Yuzu’s and Rin’s for a moment.

“Go!” she screamed. “I’ll find you!”

Then she turned, and bolted in the other direction. The tallest of the men swore.

“Get after her!” he yelled. “No, not both of you! One of you with me, after  _ those two _ !”

Rin swore, but even she didn’t seem impulsive enough to go after Ruri by running through all three of them. This time, she was the one to grab Yuzu’s wrist, and Yuzu bolted off with her, the two of them careening to the left of the next fork, and running for their lives.

Yuzu’s head swam, and it took her a moment to realize she was crying.

_ Why is this happening? _ she thought desperately.  _ Why is this  _ happening??

* * *

“Okay, just like that, and....yes!!”

Yuya gratefully pulled his now free hands away from the table, rubbing at his sore wrists.

“Great, excellent job,” Yuuri said, rattling his chair. “Now perhaps you could assist the two of us? If I have to be tied to this idiot for one moment longer, I do believe I may kill myself.”

“Hey! Who are you calling an idiot?” Yugo said, rocking their chair again.

“Shhh!” said Yuto. “Just hold still! I’ll untie you!”

Yuto’s hands were still tied, but he’d managed to get them in front of him from Yuya’s trick, which was enough motion for him to be able to untie Yuya. Yuya hopped up from his spot, briefly swaying from the aftereffects of the drug that had knocked him out. Then he hurried over to Yuuri and Yugo, and began to help with undoing the tight knots. As soon as Yuuri was free, he lunged out of his chair, stumbling towards the table and smacking into it before catching himself on it.

“Thank  _ god _ ,” he groaned, fixing his glasses on his nose. 

Yugo shot up from his seat once the ropes were gone, and promptly faceplanted on the ground.

“Yowch,” he said, rubbing his nose. “Guess I don’t have my legs back yet.”

Yuya let out a breath of relief — well, at least now that they were all untied, they had a better shot at escape...from wherever this was.

“That was great,” Yuto said, and it took Yuya a moment to realize that Yuto was speaking to him, smiling a warm, grateful smile. “I can’t believe you figured out how to get out of this.”

Yuya felt a faint blush, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Uh, thanks,” he said.

“You imbeciles, now is not the time for complimenting each other,” said Yuuri. “That was only step  _ one _ . Now we need to get  _ out _ of here before someone returns and ties us up better.”

“I’ll take on anyone who tries it!” said Yugo, holding up both fists, and Yuuri glowered.

“Will you keep it  _ down _ ?” he hissed.

Yuya looked towards the door, wondering if anyone was out there. Surely someone must be watching them, right? If they had been kidnapped, there must be a reason for it. And then there was the cult business that Reiji had been talking about...he shivered, and decided he really, really didn’t want to know what this group’s plans had been for them. He’d rather just get out of her.

“Okay,” he said. “My friends should be here soon, and we’ll want to make sure they can find us — and then we need to find the girls.”

Yuto nodded with a determined look on his face, and Yugo made soft  _ yeah _ ! of agreement. Yuuri’s nose wrinkled.

“That’s very good and selfless of you,” he said. “But  _ I _ am more concerned with surviving. Perhaps our goal should be to  _ leave _ ??”

“I’m not leaving Ruri here!” Yuto said, glaring at him.

“No way am I leaving without Rin!” said Yugo.

Yuuri groaned. He pushed his glasses back to rub his eyelids with his thumb and forefinger. Then he replaced his glasses and glared at the group.

“Are you all  _ stupid _ ?” he said. “Do you really, honestly believe that your girlfriends were brought to the same location?”

Yuya hesitated. A cold feeling grew in his stomach. He hadn’t even  _ considered _ that...

“Even if they were, how would we find them?” Yuuri said, throwing his hands up in the air. “The time it took for us to search every room in this damn building on the  _ off chance _ that those girls are here would give our captors  _ more _ than adequate time to catch us again.”

“We can fight them!” said Yugo, sticking out his bottom lip. “There’s a whole four of us!! And now that I’m not taken by surprise, I can take ‘em.”

“There may be  _ dozens _ of them involved,” Yuuri snapped. “You really think they wouldn’t plan for the possibility of their captives fighting back? I don’t care how many of us there are, we won’t stand a chance on a head-on fight.”

“You...you have a point,” Yuya mumbled, feeling sick. But he  _ couldn’t _ leave here without Yuzu! It was the whole reason he’d come! It was the reason he’d allowed himself to be taken, and put Reiji and Kurosaki in so much danger!

“It makes far more sense for us to get ourselves to a place of safety, and then call for additional assistance,” said Yuuri. 

“Oh yeah? Like who?” Yuto shot.

“The police are out of the question,” Yuya said, causing all three of them to look at him. “It was a police officer who drugged me to take me here.”

Yuto looked ashen at that. Yugo just shrugged, as though he’d figured as much.

Yuuri’s lips curled, and he grumbled under his breath.

“No wonder those idiots didn’t notice my perfect clue,” he swore softly. “I went to so much trouble to get that stupid patch while they were drugging me so that those bastards would be able to find me...and look where it got me.”

He took a moment to compose himself, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes.

“All right,” he said, replacing his glasses. “If the police are of no assistance, we have one other option.”

“Oh? And what’s that?” said Yuto, sounding sarcastic. “We ought to just leave and save ourselves?”

“No,” Yuuri said, his voice going suddenly very matter-of-fact. “Our other option is to make sure that our kidnappers are... _ incapable _ of doing this again.”

The way he said it gave Yuya pause — it made all three of them hesitate, shooting him a look. Yuuri only looked back very calmly at them. After a while, Yuto finally spoke.

“Please explain what you mean by that,” he said.

A faint smile danced over Yuuri’s lips.

“Oh, what do  _ you _ think I meant by that?”

“You were the one who just said we couldn’t possibly take them on by ourselves,” said Yuto, throwing his hands into the air. “And now you’re suggesting what? That we...kill them? All of them? How??”

“I’m sure something could be arranged,” Yuuri said airily, waving a hand dismissively. “And I  _ said _ we couldn’t  _ fight _ them headon. That didn’t include other means of doing away with them.”

“I don’t get it,” said Yugo.

Yuya’s skin crawled — Yuuri spoke so easily about...about  _ killing _ people. Sure, these people had probably killed Reiji’s sister, but...he shuddered. He didn’t think he was capable of doing that, not even in self defense. Yuuri sounded like he wanted to wage a full-scale war against them and pick them off purposefully one by one.

“Well, the first thing to do would be to lure just one of them into here,” Yuuri said. “Then we can...well, there’s quite a bit of rope in here. I think I can come up with some ways of using it.”

“Oh my god,” Yuto said, wincing.

“That will give us at least one of their cloaks,” Yuuri pressed on. “One of us can pretend to be transferring the others to another room, we find a second person, lure  _ that _ one in, find a way of disposing them...so on, and so forth.”

“And what happens when they catch on to us murdering them one by one, genius? This isn’t a movie!”

“I’m impressed that it’s only your concept of viability that you take offense to, and not the part about killing them.”

“I — of course I take offense to murder! Even if they kidnapped us, that’s not — ”

“H-hey!!” Yugo said suddenly. “I think I hear something!”

Even Yuuri immediately shut up, his jaw tensing. Yuya flinched. They went silent, each of them straining to listen.

A moment later, Yuya heard the sound of creaking outside the door.

“Grab something to defend yourself with,” he said.

Yugo grabbed one of the chairs. Yuto looked wildly around before snatching up an ancient looking desk lamp, that looked like it might crumble to dust in his fingers before he hit anyone with it. Yuuri snatched up some of the fallen rope, and Yuya just lifted his fists, hoping that maybe some of his stage combat training would kick in.

The door handle turned, slowly. All four boys tensed. The door creaked as it slowly opened.

Yuto lunged forward first, lifting his lamp up high over his head as the door pushed open all the way — and then he stopped, so suddenly he almost careened forward into the girl in the doorway.

“R-Ruri?” he said, his voice cracking with hope.

But Yuya tensed up. He recognized the face, and though for a moment he had thought  _ Yuzu _ , he recognized that hair ribbon anywhere.

Selena’s eyes flicked around the room, briefly taking in the three of them — untied and armed. Her lips tightened.

“You idiot, it’s not your girlfriend!” Yuuri snarled, clearly noticing, at the same time as Yuya, the dark cloak that Selena wore over her clothes.

Yuto’s hands tightened on the lamp.

“Selena!” Yuya gasped. “Selena!! Please, look at me!!”

He wanted her to look at him — wanted to see in her eyes for sure if she wasn’t the girl that he thought he’d been friends with. Wanted to know the  _ truth _ . Why she had taken Yuzu. Why she had taken Yuto and Ruri, why she was here, doing these terrible things.

But Selena did not look at him. Her eyes fixed on Yuto. Her lips opened.

A ringing, reverberating sound dropped from her lips, a word that Yuya’s brain couldn’t begin to comprehend, and immediately, a ringing cut through his brain. Yuto dropped his lamp, collapsing to his knees as he clapped his hands over his ears. Yuuri stumbled back into the table, and Yugo had to drop the chair, holding himself up with it. 

Tears bubbled to Yuya’s eyes from the sheer pain of it — what was this — this  _ sound _ ??

“S-Selena,” he said, but he couldn’t even hear his own voice over the ringing in his head.

It stopped as abruptly as it had began, and all four of them slumped forward, catching themselves on whatever they could grab, Yuto keeling forward onto his hands and knees. Yuya felt like he’d just run a whole marathon without break, his body twitching and shaking. Selena looked down at them impassively, as though she hadn’t just undone them with a single word.

“W-what...what the  _ fuck _ ,” Yuto said, coughing into his hand.

Selena sighed, long and deep.

“You can hear my voice when it crosses the other side,” she said. “It means that you truly are worthy of becoming vessels for our Lord.”

“What the...what on  _ earth _ are you talking about,” Yuuri gasped, sounding horrified at the weakness in his own voice.

“Only one of you can hold him, however,” Selena continued, as though Yuuri hadn’t spoken. “So we must prepare some tests to determine which of you will become the final vessel.”

“S...Selena,” Yuya gasped through his tears. “Selena, please...what are you... _ why _ are you...?”

It might have been a trick of the light. It might have been Yuya’s watering eyes. But for just a moment, Yuya thought he might have seen something flicker over Selena’s impassive face. Something....regret? Guilt? But it was gone in a moment. She stepped into the room.

“Do not be afraid,” she said. “Being chosen is a great honor. You will have the honor of becoming the body for the greatest of the dark spirits, the lord of destruction, and usher in a new era.”

“I...I don’t want to do that,” Yugo said, his voice choked. “I don’t want to do that! I just want to go  _ home _ !”

Selena stepped a little further into the room, right in front of Yuto. Her eyes, however, were on the rest of the room.

So she wasn’t ready for it when Yuto grabbed her around the legs, and lunged forward.

A little yelp escaped Selena — her eyes widened as she tumbled forward, falling face first down over Yuto’s shoulders and then collapsing to the floor.

“We — we gotta go,” Yuto gasped. “We have to go!”

The shaky feeling was beginning to fade. Yuya struggled up to his feet. Yuuri and Yugo were going now, too, and Yuto lunged for the door. Yuuri made sure to step on Selena as he ran past her, and Yuya hesitated only a moment, glancing back at her, before he ran after them.

Selena let out a loud yell — another horrible, shaking word crashed through Yuya’s brain, and he stumbled. This one seemed to light a fire beneath his skin, making all of his hair stand on end and his throat burn as though he’d swallowed something too spicy. He stumbled, vision briefly blanking out.

A hand grabbed his, and he briefly tried to yank away.

“It’s me! It’s just me!” said Yuto. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!”

Yuya blindly followed after Yuto’s hand latched around his, stumbling up and running as fast as his shaking body could manage. They ran for what felt like minutes stretched into hours, the floor creaking and groaning beneath their feet, before Yuya’s vision finally cleared enough to see the long, empty motel hallway that they were careening down. Yuto whipped them around the first corner he found, and kept running. Yuya’s lungs burned, this time from the running instead of the strange word Selena had spoken.

It was only when they were halfway down the next hallway that he realized there was a problem.

“Yuto...Yuto!” he gasped.

Yuto sounded as though he were gasping for air, too, and he stumbled to a stop without complaint when Yuya tugged on him. For a moment, the two of them just stood there, bent over, gripping each other’s hands as they gasped for air.

Yuya looked over his shoulder, and confirmed what he’d already noticed.

Yuuri and Yugo were nowhere to be seen.


	9. Chapter 9

Shun swore as he watched Reiji disappear into the darkness, his own hand still fumbling to get the damn seatbelt off of himself. Idiots! They were going to draw attention from whoever was out there! 

As soon as he was out of the vehicle, he quickly considered his options — run around the car and jump into the driver’s seat and make sure he had a weapon of sorts to ram into things, go after Reiji and Reira, or track down the mysterious movement himself.

He unfortunately did not get a chance to make the decision. Bushes rustled, twigs snapped — whatever was moving through the woods did not care about being heard.

“Who’s out here?” someone shouted. “This is private property!”

Shun’s eyes darted through the trees, trying to judge where the sound came from. Something moved in the direction he’d seen it before, and a dark shape moved out into the faintest of lights. It would be generous to call it person-shaped, but it was definitely person-sized. 

“I didn’t see any signs,” Shun shot back, flicking his eyes around to make sure there weren’t any other surprises moving around him. He heard something snap in the trees to his right, and tensed. Was it an animal, or a second person?

He winced when a flashlight suddenly burst to life and shone in his face. He threw one arm over his eyes to shade them, squinting through the light towards the person-sized figure who had just turned it on. 

“Oy, watch where you’re pointing that thing,” he snapped.

The person let out a scoff.

“You should be glad I’m not shooting you yet,” they snapped. “Get back in your car and turn around — this is  _ private property _ .”

“You need to put up a damn sign, then,” Shun said. His heart screamed in his chest and it was taking everything he had not to lunge forward immediately at this guy and throttle them til they spilled where Ruri was. Yuya had been taken  _ here _ . That meant Ruri and Yuto must be too! And that meant these guys whining about  _ private property _ were those cult guys that Reiji had talked about, or regular kidnappers, or whatever. 

But he still didn’t know who else was in the woods, and he knew better than to make sudden moves — not when he was so  _ close _ .

“Look, I’m just lost,” he growled. “I was...trying to get to the highway.”

The person hesitated on their way towards him, still shining the flashlight practically in his face.

“Pretty wrong turn for the highway,” they said slowly.

_ Shit _ . Had Shun gotten his directions wrong? He made an attempt at a forced, hollow laugh.

“Yeah, I’m pretty bad with directions.”

Another snap to his right — someone was there. Someone who was  _ really bad _ at hiding. 

“Look, kid, I’m gonna call the police if you don’t get the hell out of here,” the person said. They were only a few feet away from him now. It would be so easy to snatch at him — 

“Okay, okay,” he said, putting his hands up and backing towards the car. “I’m going.”

As soon as the flashlight tilted towards the ground, enough for him not to be blinded, he lunged.

The guy holding the flashlight yelped as Shun tackled him, striking him right in the throat with the blade of his arm and shoving him down to the ground. The flashlight went flying from his hand and spun around on the ground, shooting rays all over the place against the trees. Someone swore, and Shun ducked just as the mysterious figure to the right lurched for him.

It was obvious these guys weren’t fighters. The guy to the right stumbled forward, following through too far on his swipe and tripping over Shun, sprawling over the ground face first. Shun dug one hand into the guy’s throat beneath him, pinning him down and causing him to scrabble for air. Now that Shun had him only inches from him, even in the dark he could tell this guy was about the same age as his own moms, gaunt and with a five-o-clock shadow and bony fingers that couldn’t get Shun’s hand off of him. The weird shadowy shape had been caused by the dark cloak that had been draped over him, and the other guy wore the same thing — from behind, Shun could see the same symbol that Reiji had showed him before was stitched in red on the back. Not very subtle at all.

As Shun held him down, he reached into his jacket and pulled out his switchblade, snapping it open and holding it up so that the distant light of the flashlight could catch over the metal. The man’s eyes bulged, and he immediately froze. Beside him, the other guy was still trying to get onto his knees, rubbing at his forehead.

“All right,” Shun growled, holding the blade close to the man’s cheek. “Now you guys are going to tell me what I want to know, or you’re going to lose an eyeball.”

“Fucking hell,” the man beneath him squeezed out around Shun’s grip on his throat. “Holy shit.”

The guy on the ground had managed to turn around, still looking dizzy, but freezing appropriately when he saw Shun and his knife. Shun suppressed the urge to smile for a moment —  _ finally _ . Finally, he was doing something concrete to get Ruri and Yuto back. None of this fucking research and stalking around looking for clues business — just a good old fashioned fight.

At least, that’s what he thought before a hand the side of a trash can gripped him around the entirety of his head, and yanked him into the air.

He couldn’t even yell, he was so shocked — the knife went flying from his hand as he was lifted a good two feet from the ground. He kicked wildly, but the more he moved, the more tension he put on his neck. He reached up for the — the  _ giant fingers _ — that held his whole head in  _ one hand _ . Scratching and clawing and prying seemed to have absolutely no effect on it. How the fuck — the hell — 

Then the ground surged towards him and he realized, just before impact, that he was being slammed against the ground.

Stars exploded over his eyes and he crumpled. Pain shot through his body and it took everything he had to remain conscious. His head screamed, and he wondered if he’d cracked bone in his head. The hand did not release his head. In fact, after it crushed him painfully into the dirt for a moment, stuffing his mouth and nose with dust and bits of rock, it lifted him back up.

Oh  _ fuck _ . Shun hung there, limply, his arms barely even able to lift. He felt like a  _ ragdoll _ . A ringing filled his ears, and the stars in his eyes were so bright that he couldn’t see anything else.

On the ground below him, he faintly heard the other man coughing.

“Fucking  _ hell _ ,” he coughed. “I told you! I told you we needed it out here on patrol! Told you of all nights, it would be tonight someone found us all out!”

Shun dangled dizzily from the hand, barely able to comprehend. He struggled to regain his breath, but his lungs felt tight and thin. He could barely think for the flares of shock that rang through his brain and his entire body. He felt his body swing limply as he was moved through the air.

“No!” someone shouted, and his movement stopped. “Drop it.”

There was a brief pause, and the fingers curled tighter against the sides of Shun’s head. Then they released, and Shun crumpled face first to the ground, his whole body shuddering.

“Hell, what are you doing? Let it kill him.”

“Are you stupid or something? We have no idea who else he’s told about this place, or who else is coming? We need information before we kill him!”

Shun’s body shuddered as he drew in a thick, heavy breath. He twitched his fingers, then curled them into the dirt and leaves. Slowly, his vision was coming back. His body still shook, but...well, he’d taken pretty heavy hits to the head before. This one pretty much blew every street fight out of the water with just a single blow, but he was sturdy. He sucked in two more deep, ragged breaths, willing the strength to return to his limbs.

_ Come on! You stupid shit!! You’re so close!! _

Hands gripped his shoulders and lifted him from both sides without ceremony. He gasped, expelling another lungful of air as he was slammed, though with less force, against the back of a tree trunk. The flashlight snapped into his eyes again and he flinched, the light even worse to his aching head.

“Who else is with you!” a voice demanded. “Answer me! Who do you work with?”

He saw his own knife in the hands of one of his captors, waving it wildly in his face. One of the much smaller hands grabbed his hair and shook him by it, making him wrack with coughs — and with rage.

He’d come this far? This far, this close, and now he was going to die? Interrogated by a couple of idiots and then stabbed with his own goddamn knife after getting attacked by...by what? He was going to quit now?

He sucked in another rattling breath, and the man shook him by his hair again.

“Answer me, dammit! Or should I let the Repository at you again??”

Shun grit his teeth. His hands twitched at his sides again. The flashlight waved in his vision, and he couldn’t see for shit.

But the adrenaline was beginning to pump through him now. He was going to die. He was looking death in the face, so close,  _ so close _ to Ruri and Yuto.

It was enough to make a man burst past human limits, if only for a moment.

His interrogator screeched pitifully when Shun flung both his hands up, smacking both flashlight and blade hand up into the air. In the same movement, Shun grabbed both of the man’s wrists, and used him to lever himself up while swinging him around and slamming him face first into the tree. 

“Kill him, kill him, kill him!!” the smaller of the two men shrieked, from somewhere just out of sight. Shun tightened his lips grimly.  _ Thanks for telling me where you are. _

As soon as the flashlight hit the ground, Shun snatched it, whipping it around and blasting it into the face of the other, who yelled and stumbled back.

The flashlight beam caught something else. For  _ just _ a moment, Shun’s newfound strength almost faltered and washed out of him.

The beam ran over a pair of legs as thick around as tree trunks, so big that they had to bow at the knees, Shun’s head only coming  _ barely  _ up to the waist they attached to. Horrific long metal pieces, circuit-like in shape, appeared to be  _ bolted _ into the thing’s flesh — if it  _ had _ flesh. An arm so long that its hand reached its knees lifted up from the side of the  _ thing _ , and began to reach towards him. He resisted the urge to move the light up and see what else was attached to the torso. He didn’t need to know.

He needed to  _ run. _

He forgot his knife. He grabbed the man stunned from the flashlight by the face, and flung him towards the gigantic, trash can sized hand reaching for him.

The man shrieked as it was  _ his _ face that the hand closed around. Shun didn’t wait to see what would happen next. He turned and bolted through the trees, head down and simply charging straight through the branches.

He broke free of the trees and stumbled as the ground began to rise around him. He didn’t hear pursuit yet, but his heart was also screaming in his ears along with the adrenaline and the ringing, so he couldn’t really hear  _ anything _ . Just up the hill was the complex. Shun swore — no other choice. He ran full tilt towards the building.

The hill did a number on him, reminding him that his body  _ should not  _ be moving in this state, reminding him that he was running on borrowed time, and he would likely give out sooner or later.

At the top of the hill, he burst onto a small parking lot, stumbling to find that the ground had leveled off. An old, broken motel sign sat at the edge of it, most of the letters fallen off so that it read  _ o V can y _ instead of  _ No Vacancy _ . 

He let himself fall against the sign for just a moment, fingers digging into the side as he struggled to keep his body upright. He looked desperately for an entrance — there! A set of double doors, leading into a lighted lobby. And there didn’t appear to be anyone inside.

A more conscious Shun may have wondered at this. Patrols outside, but no sign of guards inside? Or anyone at all? Something niggled at him vaguely underneath the adrenaline.

But then his eyes flickered back down the hill.

In the darkness, lit only by the stars, it was hard to make out the difference between the stain of trees at the bottom of the hill, and the hill itself. The flashlight dangled from his hands, but he didn’t dare turn it down the hill to see what was there.

And yet...he could still see the shadow, huge and lumbering, peel itself away from the trees. Bile rose in his throat to see the inhuman shape, the faint glint of the starlight against the metal pieces that seemed screwed into every inch of it. And, worst of all, what he thought might be something limp and unmoving dragging against the ground from one of its large hands.

Shun staggered towards the door — whatever was in there, it  _ had _ to be better than what was out there. What even the hell — what the hell was going on out here??

He smacked his whole body against the glass. He shoved on the door and it did not budge. Locked??

Through the haze of pain and ringing, his eyes fell on the sign.  _ Please Pull. _

He yanked on the door, and threw himself inside. Could that monster fit through the doors? He didn’t want to find out. He looked quickly and wildly at the empty motel lobby, and chose a door at random.

His body was starting to slowly remember that it was broken, and every step was dragging against him, but he pushed forward. He grabbed the handle, shoved himself through, and stared out at a long hallway of nothing but doors with room numbers.

He swallowed, thickly, dizzily, as though he were watching his body from a distance.

He wasn’t sure how much longer his body could last on this adrenaline. Better not find out. He kept going.

* * *

“You are an absolute  _ imbecile!! _ Of all the — I cannot believe your stupidity!!”

Yugo was starting to get really tired of being called names. He pressed his lips together tightly as he looked around the corner of another hallway and found this one as long and empty and  _ the same _ as the rest.

Behind him, Yuuri threw his hands into the air, eyes wild behind his glasses. His hair was a complete mess now; it had still been sort of slicked back when he’d been brought to their makeshift cell, but now it was really coming apart, falling messy strangs all over his face and around his ears, and he seemed too bothered to notice.

“Do you look where you’re going before you do anything? Do you think? Do you think before you do things like  _ grab me  _ and make me run  _ in the opposite direction  _ of our only allies in this godforsaken place?”

“Well, I don’t see you doing anything!!” Yugo shot back. “You were totally  _ frozen _ . What was I supposed to do, leave you there?”

“I’d almost rather that than be stuck with  _ you _ .”

Yugo considered the benefits of punching Yuuri in the jaw, and, reluctantly, decided that they didn’t outweigh the costs. Later. After they were out of this mess.

“Well, maybe I  _ should  _ have left you with the crazy demon speak lady!” he said. “I’m sorry, okay!! I didn’t see where Yuya and Yuto ran off to! I was just tryin’ to get us out of there!”

“And this is why you’re obviously the worst of this group to end up with!!” Yuuri shot at him, glowering. “You don’t  _ look _ . At anything! You just charge forward!”

“We’ve only known each other for a couple of days!! How do you know anything about me?”

“A few days is  _ more _ than enough to realize that your head is thicker than a  _ brick _ . It’s your fault we got tied up together in the first place, because you couldn’t calm down and read a situation!”

Yugo bristled, turning away from the hallway to glare at Yuuri. His fists rolled up at his sides.

“Well, what would you have done??” he said. “The door was wide open!! You think I wasn’t gonna take the chance to get away?”

“If you had taken more than a second to realize what you were doing, you would have realized the guards were  _ right outside the door _ ,” Yuuri snapped back. “And if you —”

“No, shut up!!” Yugo said, really tensing up now. “I’m just tryin’ to do what I can!! Maybe instead of complaining all the time, you could think of something you could do, instead of getting mad at me for trying all the time!”

He jabbed his finger into Yuuri’s face, but Yuuri only scowled at it and pushed it away. Yugo kept going anyway.

“At least  _ trying _ is better than sitting there and just letting things happen to you!” he said. “Or were you just going to wait until they did whatever the hell they were saying about stuffing some guy in us?”

Yuuri’s face paled, but he tightened his lips and looked angrily away. Yugo sucked in an angry breath.

“If you’re scared, just  _ say so _ ,” Yugo said. “And if you don’t want me to be such an idiot, then tell me what  _ your _ genius ideas are!”

Yuuri actually  _ flinched _ . He angrily fixed his glasses, and shoved his hand through his hair as though in an attempt to slick it back — though most of it simply fell out of place again.

“I,” he said angrily, though a lot more quietly, “am not  _ scared _ .”

Yugo’s irritation flooded out of him, and his shoulders and arms slumped back down. He realized then that Yuuri’s hands were shaking — very slightly, maybe, but enough that it was definitely happening. Oh. He’d been sort of bullshitting, but...Yuuri actually  _ was _ scared? Yugo felt a little less upset now — well, only a little. Yuuri was  _ still _ an ass. But he guessed someone acting like an ass because they were scared was better than someone just...being an ass. Well, maybe he was an ass normally, but — ugh! Whatever. Yugo still didn’t want him to get killed or anything, or whatever that girl that looked like Rin had been talking about.

He peered around the corner again to see if anyone was down the hallway — and his heart skipped a beat. At the end of the hallway, a pair of people in black robes had appeared. They were too far away for him to hear, but he saw them gesturing, and then they both started walking down the hall.

Yugo yanked himself back around the corner, snatched Yuuri’s wrists, and started to run in the opposite direction. Yuuri spluttered and tried to yank free, but Yugo did not let him, causing him to half stumble, half get dragged, after him.

“What are you doing now, you idiot?” Yuuri said.

“Shh!! There’s someone down that hallway!! I think they’re looking for us!”

Yuuri’s demeanor changed so quickly it almost made Yugo trip with surprise. Instantly, Yuuri was the one running faster than Yugo, dragging  _ him _ along!

They reached the other end of the hallway, and Yugo quickly looked both directions — he couldn’t even remember which way they had come from, everything looked so much the damn same!

“There they are!” 

“Grab them!!”

Yugo swore. He dove to the left, and Yuuri tried to go right. They were still holding onto each other, so they snapped back and smacked into each other.

“What are you  _ doing _ ??” Yuuri practically shrieked.

“Just run!! Follow me or don’t, I don’t care!!”

Yugo actually did, sort of, care — but at the moment, Yuuri was being too difficult and was going to get them both caught! He let go of Yuuri and bolted down the left hallway. After a beat, he heard feet behind him, and when he glanced over his shoulder, there was a pale-faced Yuuri, running after him. Yugo bit back a self-satisfied grin — despite their situation, thinking of Yuuri’s tough words before combined with now, where Yuuri clearly wasn’t willing to be alone after all, made Yugo feel just a little pleased with himself.

They made it to the end of the next hallway, and this one only turned to the left. Yugo careened around it and — 

_ SMACK _ !

He flew backwards, tumbling into Yuuri, and the two of them collapsed backwards onto the worn carpet. Yugo bounced quickly back up, elbowing Yuuri in the stomach as he did so. He whipped his fists up, ready to slug whoever they’d just run into — 

The guy staggered back, looking dizzy. He grabbed at the nearest door handle to steady himself, one hand clutched to his head. He looked — well, he looked pretty beat up. There was dirt and twigs in his hair, and his sweater was dirty and torn in places. There was a nasty looking bruise forming on his forehead, mostly concealed by the swoop of his bangs.

And his eyes widened, lips parted when he saw Yugo.

“Y-Yuto?” he gasped.

Yugo’s mouth dropped open, and he stared maybe longer than he should have.

Yuuri struggled up beside him, swearing.

“Neither of us are Yuto!” he snapped. “I’m assuming your Yuto’s stupid friend who helped with such a stupid plan! Perhaps you might decide to assist us in escaping?”

It dawned on Yugo all at once — oh, right!! This must be that...that...Kurosawa guy they’d been talking about? Yeah, that was definitely his name.

Kurosawa’s eyes narrowed at the two of them for a moment. Then he seemed to hear the feet and shouts from the other hallway. He swore, and let go of the door to grab the two of them around the arms, hauling them along.

“Oy! I can move myself!” Yugo said.

“Yes, but  _ I  _ can’t for much longer,” Kurosawa said through grit teeth. He banged his shoulder against the nearest motel door and it did not budge. Growling, he moved on to the next one, dragging the other two along with him. Yugo could feel the guy’s grip slipping on him, and he was starting to stumble a little bit, like he was getting dizzy. Yugo snatched up his arm, and Yuuri hissed.

“If you’re going to hold us back, I’m just leaving you behind!” he snapped, trying to wriggle out of the guy’s grip.

The guy didn’t try too hard to hold onto Yuuri, or maybe he was just starting to run out of strength. His weight began to sag against Yugo’s grip, and Yugo looked nervously back towards the other end of the hall. They weren’t going to get away at this rate!!

Yuuri began trying doors, too, jiggling their hands one at a time, and then darting down to the next one. Yugo tried desperately to support the Kurosawa guy, but he was starting to panic. A cold sweat broke out over his neck and his lungs were tight. He didn’t — he didn’t actually want to leave either of them behind. He didn’t think he could!! How could he live with himself if he did? What would he tell Rin? But he couldn’t — he didn’t think he could protect the two of them, either!! So what was he...what could he...

Yuuri grabbed the next door handle, and before he could even turn it, it opened on its own. Yuuri’s lips formed a surprised “o” as he was nearly tugged inside with by his grip on the handle, stumbling back just at the right time. Kurosawa tensed and tried to stand up straight, and Yugo flung his one free fist up.

The man who stepped through the door was so tall that his bald head almost brushed the top of the frame. He wore a dark suit and darker eyes. And — Yugo realized belatedly — he was also carrying a shotgun.

Yugo shoved himself and the Kurosawa guy to the side, slamming them both into the opposite wall as the man lifted up his shotgun.

Two shots echoed through the hall, and Yugo waited for the pain to hit. He cracked open one eye. The man still held the shotgun up, but he wasn’t looking at Yugo, or Yuuri on the floor near the door staring at him, or anyone except...

Yugo’s eyes wandered slowly, nervously towards the end of the hall.

Two black robed bodies laid, shuddering, on the floor. But neither of them were making any move to get up. He felt bile rise in his throat, and had to clap his hands over his mouth to stop himself from throwing up.

Kurosawa tried to force himself to his feet, swaying as he did so, eyes fixed on the man. For a long moment, no one spoke.

Then the man lowered his gun, letting out a soft  _ huff _ .

“More will come at the sounds,” he said. “You’d best get in here while you can.”

He stepped back into the room, and left the door open. Yugo stared, open-mouthed for a moment. Could...could they hide in there? That guy  _ had _ shot the bad guys. Maybe he was a good guy? Yugo looked across at Yuuri. Yuuri was already glaring at him.

“Absolutely not,” he mouthed.

But Kurosawa swayed again, and this time, he collapsed to his knees. Yugo scrambled up to hold his shoulders. They couldn’t just leave him! He’d...come to rescue them, after all! He looked up at Yuuri pleadingly.

“For the love of...” Yuuri hissed. He glanced at the door again, suspicious. Then he shook his head.

“We are going to get ourselves killed,” he said, but he walked back over, and helped Yugo get Kurosawa under the shoulders, heaving him towards the open motel room door.


	10. Chapter 10

Reiji couldn’t see anything in this damn forest. He stumbled against a tree, clinging to the bark and trying to hear over the sound of his heart shrieking in his ears for any sign of Reira. Where had they  _ gone _ ?? Reira wasn’t — they weren’t physically very strong. They couldn’t usually run for very long — so they had to have come to a stop  _ somewhere _ nearby, right? Unless Reiji had gotten turned around in the dark...dammit!! It was so damn  _ dark _ ! He couldn’t see a thing! 

His body ached with the bruises of running into branches and trees, and he let himself take a moment to regain some of his breath. Reira could _ not _ be much farther — but they were probably deep in the midst of a disassociation episode, lost and alone out in an unfamiliar darkness, with possible killers stalking the wood — they were probably panicking. He had to — had to find them, now.

Reiji stumbled around the tree, feeling blindly through the woods with both hands forward. His feet cracked and crackled against the leaves and foliage, and he tripped over a bush, only barely catching himself. His wrists protested from the strain of slamming into the ground, but he shoved himself back up to his feet anyway. His entire body shrieked from the leaves and branches smacking into his hands as he moved through them, and if he was going to be completely honest, he was very,  _ very _ close to a meltdown of his own. Even in the dark, the sound of his own blood in his ears and the white-hot feeling of being out of breath was enough to nudge him towards sensory overload. If he didn’t stop and calm down soon...

The thought of Reira, having a meltdown of their own with even less means to cope with it, was the only thing that kept Reiji barely clinging to sanity. He kept going, one foot in front of the other. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he thought about how illogical his path was. He had no idea where he was, what direction he was going, or if he was even anywhere  _ near _ Reira. But the screaming of his body and brain was enough to wipe every bit of logic out of him, and all he could do was continue stomping blindly forward, feeling a tidal wave of overwhelming  _ emotion _ building and building and building until it was going to force every bit of  _ him _ out of himself — 

His legs smacked into something that was  _ not  _ a bush, and his arms wheeled, trying to keep himself upright by pure instinct. His feet stumbled back and he struck a tree. He could hardly see, his vision blurring. Whatever he’d bumped into was small and had  _ give _ , and he heard it gasp and hit the ground, heard even the tiny swirls of the dust the shape sprayed up when it hit the ground.

_ Reira _ , Reiji realized with a stab of utter, sudden relief. That sound was Reira’s voice, there was no doubt about it.

Reira gasped and sobbed softly, and Reiji simply collapsed to his knees, throwing his arms around Reira. 

His one remaining pillar of strength fled him, and for a moment, he felt like his mind ceased to exist. His arms were clinging to Reira, hugging his sibling to his chest as tightly as possible as though to engrave the feeling of holding onto them, but he felt as though he, himself, were not performing the action. He couldn’t force out a single word, could barely even formulate one in his head.  _ Are you hurt _ , he wanted to gasp, but the words simply wouldn’t come. His head tucked against Reira’s, and he closed his eyes for only a moment.

When he opened them again, Reira’s shakes had subsided, and the out-of-body experience of his own had dissipated — leaving his body drained, his limbs hollow, his chest heavy with every breath.

_ Meltdown, _ he thought vaguely.  _ I haven’t had one in a very long time. _

Reira’s fingers had curled into his scarf, pulling it a bit uncomfortably tight against his neck. 

“Reira,” Reiji gasped, his throat feeling tight and cracked. He coughed once, trying to summon some saliva to wet his dusty throat. “Reira. It’s all right. I’m here.”

Reira sucked in a rattling breath and tucked themself tighter into Reiji. They didn’t seem capable of being verbal yet, so Reiji just held onto them, trying to regain his own functions.

_ I need to sleep for a day _ , he thought numbly. His brain was completely wiped, and forming thoughts was still hard. He  _ had _ to, though. They were still here. Still out here who knew where.

He shifted his grip on Reira, carefully holding onto them while he found his phone and slid it out of his pocket. Thank god he still had it. The glowing screen actually blinded him at the lowest light setting, and he winced as he felt a stabbing pain from it coursing into his eyes. He managed to squint through it, though, to check the time.

His skin crawled as he confirmed what he had suspected. 10:35. Time had  _ still _ not moved. And he still had no signal. He swallowed through a dry throat, and slid his phone back into his pocket, shifting his grip on Reira again.

“Reira,” he said. “Reira, can you try to stand up? I don’t...I don’t think I can carry you.”

Reira let out a thin whine.

“Screaming.”

Reiji blinked. It sounded like it had taken considerable effort for them to get the word out, and Reiji frowned.

“What?” he said. “Reira, are you all right? Are you hurt? Does something hurt?”

Reira shook their head quickly, and leaned back, looking up towards Reiji. In the dark, Reiji could only barely see the impression of their face. They tugged insistently on Reiji’s shirt and scarf.

“ _ Screaming _ ,” Reira gasped. “They’re — they’re screaming.”

Reiji tried to be patient, but his own brain was so shot, he was having trouble translating what Reira was trying to convey.

“Do you mean that you hear something?”

Reira nodded wildly. They pointed off into the woods, and Reiji looked, but he saw nothing but darkness.

“ _ Closer _ ,” Reira gasped.

Reiji tensed. He strained his ears, but he felt like all of his ability to process his senses had deadened.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s go away from what’s scared you, all right? Can you stand up?”

Reira’s legs shook, but they could. Reiji supported them under the arms, but with very little confidence. He felt like his bones had disappeared and his body was simply made of unsupported flesh.

Gripping Reira’s hand, he began to carefully move through the darkness away from the direction Reira had pointed out. He noticed it seemed lighter in that direction, and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. Were they headed towards the building they had seen before?

_ Yuya and Yuzu are still in there _ , Reiji thought.  _ And — and Kurosaki. I abandoned him. He said he’d seen something in the woods. _

He tightened his jaw, feeling a horrible sense of guilt crush his lungs. He should have  _ stopped _ Yuya from going forward with this crazy plan. And Kurosaki was a regular civilian as well, whom Reiji had not attempted to stop from coming with him on this fool’s errand, now lost and possibly in danger. If either of them were hurt...it would be blood on  _ Reiji’s  _ hands.

And yet, he couldn’t go running after them, not with Reira...he was well and truly trapped.

Reira  _ screamed _ .

Reiji stopped dead, holding Reira’s hand as tight as possible — but Reira was running, now, and Reiji had to stumble to keep up with them. 

“Reira!” he gasped. “Reira, what are we —”

Reira jerked them to the side and Reiji only barely skirted around a tree.

It only then that he heard the crashing in the trees behind them. 

He almost choked. It was so  _ loud _ . It sounded like a bulldozer was crashing through the trees and knocking the down. He heard branches snap, trunks groan. Then suddenly they were out of the trees, and Reira was trying desperately to drag Reiji up the hill towards — towards the complex. The cult’s base of operations.

“Reira, wait!” he cried.

“Closer!” Reira shrieked back.

Reiji stumbled on the incline, and fell to one knee. Reira had held so tightly to his hand that they were yanked back, smacking into Reiji. Reiji managed to hold them both up, preventing them from tumbling back down the hill.

The ground  _ shook _ . Reiji’s heart rattled up through his lungs and into his throat, and he made the mistake of looking over his shoulder.

The creature — because it could not possibly be  _ human _ — towered over them, probably almost twice his size. It’s proportions were  _ wrong _ , with a waist far too small to support its massive torso, arms so long they reached the thick, knobby knees. Starlight glinted off of the metal that was  _ screwed _ into the flesh, tearing the fabric that only marginally clung to its body. 

Reiji simply froze. His throat dried.

The creature stomped to a stop near them. It hovered a moment, motionless. Reiji saw something, however, swing slightly from the monster’s hand, and his eyes involuntarily flickered down. He vomited into his throat. That — that was a  _ body _ . It was — it was carrying a body.

Its massive fist had very clearly  _ crushed _ the body’s head, but it was still dragging the broken, limp corpse, still dripping blood down its side, from its hand, like a child carrying a rag doll. Reiji bit back an unreleased scream, and spluttered the bile from his mouth onto the ground as another heaving roil of disgust crashed through him.

The monster swayed slightly a moment, the metal shimmering slightly as though a brief burst of electricity had run through it. Then its head swung down, leaning towards Reiji. It was just as big as the rest of the creature, human in shape, perhaps, but the features were grotesquely  _ stretched _ and  _ compressed _ at the same time, somehow, in a way that his mind could barely fathom. One of its eyes was gone, leaving a massive, gaping black hole in its head. The other glowed a demonic red. Reiji watched, open-mouthed and frozen, as that eye twisted in its socket and its pupil expanded. Jagged, half missing teeth revealed as the lips stretched across its face like a scar.

He could hardly comprehend this. What — what  _ was _ this? He had expected cultists and maniacal zealots. Not —  _ this _ .

Reiji watched, frozen and distant, as its free hand slowly moved towards Reiji. The fingers began to slowly enclose around his head, and he imagined a moment his own head popping like a grape, splattering blood all over his body and over Reira underneath him —

Reira.

Reiji snapped back to his own body. Adrenaline coursed through him. He snatched Reira up like a rag doll under one arm with strength he had never had before in his life, much less after the ravages of a panic attack and a meltdown, ducked under the slow moving hand, and bolted.

The hill seemed like nothing to the sudden panic induced flight of his body. He felt the ground shake under his feet, threatening to unseat his grip on the earth, but he kept running. He didn’t look back. Reira screamed, over and over, until it seemed they shouldn’t have any breath in them.

Something snagged Reiji’s fluttering scarf. He gagged — the scarf tightened about his neck, and Reira fell from his arms as he was suddenly hoisted into the air. 

He dangled helplessly from the monster’s grip, clawing and kicking at his scarf-turned-noose. No, no, no! He could not — he couldn’t die here! Not in front of Reira!!

A massive hand wrapped around his torso, and he could feel the remnants of blood from the other dead person soak into his shirt and he wanted to throw up. Massive fingers tightened around him, slowly squeezing what little air he had left out of him as his scarf only pulled tighter — 

“LET NIISAMA GO!”

Reira’s voice cut above everything else, louder than Reiji had ever heard them scream. The sudden squeezing around his waist halted. The scarf ties slid from the monster’s hand and he gasped desperately for air, slumping against the hand that still held him in the air.

The fingers twitched. Reiji felt something briefly dig into his stomach, and he gasped, blinking through the spots in his eyes and looking down.

The creature’s hand was... _ bubbling _ .

The fingers loosened, and Reiji slipped limply from it, crumpling to the ground. Reira immediately rushed to his side, throwing their arms around him and sobbing. Reiji tried to keep his seat, but he was so  _ dizzy _ .

The ground shook, and then again, and he gasped — the creature was back on them. Whatever had startled it was...

But when he looked over his shoulder, something... _ else _ was happening.

The creature clawed at its own face, mouth wide open in a silent scream. Its skin  _ bubbled _ , as though its flesh were boiling water, the fabric rippling with the movement. It was like something, many somethings, were under the creature’s skin and trying to burst free. The metal remained stiff, but the skin was trying to burst its way free of the metal, straining against the bonds.

“Still screaming,” Reira sobbed, and for a moment, Reiji thought he could hear it — a strange, high-pitched whine that emitted from somewhere  _ within _ the monster. Not from its vocal cords, but somewhere under its skin, bubbling up with the rest of its boiling flesh. His stomach lurched again, and he spat the last of the bile from his mouth.

It took everything he had to get his legs underneath him. Reira tried to help, but they were shaking so badly that they seemed liable to collapse.

Whatever was happening to that  _ thing _ , they needed to make use of the distraction. Think — think  _ logically _ , Reiji, he ordered himself.  _ That’s all you’re good for, so do it right!! _

He forced himself one step after the other, towards the building. Whatever the hell was in there, it couldn’t be worse than  _ this _ . They stumbled onto a parking lot, where a broken down sign read out the remnants of  _ no vacancy _ , and light spilled out through the glass doors. Behind them, the high pitched buzzing sound peaked — it cut through Reiji’s ears and he winced, but he didn’t let himself stop moving.

Then, slowly, it seemed to subside, until the only ringing came from Reiji’s ears.

Reira clung to him, half supporting him, half being supported, and they stumbled up to the doors. He felt as though he were using the last of his strength just to pull the door open, shove Reira through, and stumble through himself.

He collapsed immediately to the old, thread-worn carpet, his very bones twitching with the exertion.

_ This isn’t safe enough,  _ he thought vaguely.  _ That creature could easily force its way inside after us. We need...need to keep moving...I need to move. _

But his body would not respond. His eyes felt so heavy. Reira shook his shoulder desperately, and it was all Reiji could do to twitch his fingers. His vision faded in and out. Dammit. Dammit!! He should be stronger than this — 

“Ah,” said a very tight, angry voice. “Well, perhaps  _ this _ is part of the problem.”

Reiji flinched, and tried to move. He didn’t have a chance to do so, however, before someone snatched Reira under the arms, and then grabbed him, dragging him up to his knees. He didn’t even have it in him to fight back, though Reira kicked and screamed against the black-robed person who held them. Two pairs of hands held Reiji under his arms, and one against the back of his head to secure him.

“Put — put Reira down,” Reiji gasped. “Put them down!”

The man who stood before his captives only sneered, lips curling, making his already sharp angled face look even more severe. His slicked blond hair looked as though it was so tight that it was pulling the skin of his face tight over his thin face.

“I think not,” the man said. “Instead, I believe you are going to tell me what the meaning of tonight’s commotion is.”


	11. Chapter 11

Shun cursed his weak, noodle body. He was forced to let these two scrawny Yuto-lookalikes carry him into the room, despite his own internal instincts screaming that they definitely shouldn’t trust this random guy. But he didn’t have the room or strength to argue, and then they were inside the motel room, and the man was dropping a bar over the door to seal it off from the inside.

The Yuto lookalikes helped lower him to the ground with varying degrees of success — the one with the glasses practically just dropped him, leaving him off balance and making the other boy almost lost grip on him. Shun managed to slide to his knees, his entire body throbbing.

“What even happened to you?” the one with the glasses asked, nose wrinkling. “You look like you were struck by a semi-truck.”

Shun wiped a trickle of blood he was just noticing dripping from his nose on the back of his hand.

“Monster,” he grunted.

The other boy’s eyes got huge.

“No way,” he said. “A monster? What was it?? And you’re Kurosawa, right?? Yuya said you were coming!”

Shun swung his head to the other boy, eyes wide.

“Yuya’s here? He’s all right? What about Yuto?”

“They might be dead by now, for all we know,” the glasses boy said, sniffing as he fixed his glasses on his nose.

Shun whirled on him, stress and anger spiking. But pain lanced through him, and he had to crumple over his knees, gasping for breath.

“Don’t move so much.”

The voice came from the man with the shotgun. Shun forced himself to sit up, turning his head over his shoulder to get a look at him.

The man was probably much taller than Shun was, and his head was shaved bald. He had a gray, gaunt look to him, but he was still broader than Shun. His dark, deep-set eyes were...somehow familiar. Shun frowned, but he couldn’t quite place it. 

The man held his gaze for a moment, otherwise expressionless. Then he let out a small huff, and walked past the trio of them to the old, sagging table in the back. He put his shotgun onto it, and reached for a suitcase next to it, popping it open. After a moment, he lifted out a small syringe and a vial of some weird yellow liquid. He popped the lid off and began to fill the syringe. Shun tensed. The glasses kid next to him stiffened as well, eyes locked on the syringe.

“This is medicine,” the man said, as though he’d noticed their discomfort. “It will help speed the healing of your injuries.”

“Yeah right,” Shun said, putting both of his arms out to half push the other two behind him.

The man flicked his eyes to Shun, and then finished filling syringe, putting the vial aside.

“If I wanted you to die, I would have let the cult have you.”

“Unless you’re  _ part _ of the cult, and this is all a trap,” Shun snapped. “And you plan on using us for whatever bullshit you’re doing here!”

The man let out a soft grunt, shaking his head.

“Your apprehension is a boon to you out here. But rest assured when I say that I would rather cut my own belly than let these bastards take anymore innocent lives.”

An actual emotion entered his voice then, curling his lips and whetting the edge of his harsh tone. Shun frowned. Something about that made him feel like something was familiar again....

“Let me assume,” the man continued, approaching them. Shun tensed, pushing the boys behind him again despite the other boy’s muffled protest. The man crouched down in front of Shun so that they were at eye level, and Shun refused to drop the man’s gaze. He considered him for a long moment.

“Let me assume,” he said again, “they’ve taken someone precious to you. That is why you are here. To take them back.”

Shun’s eyes narrowed. And then they widened. His mouth dropped open as it hit him, all at once — he knew why this man was so familiar.

“Shit,” he said. “You’re his dad.”

The man’s brow furrowed, and his lips tightened. Shun pushed forward — there was no mistaking it, now; that gaze was too similar, and now that he knew what he was looking for, he could see the resemblance in the makeup of the man’s face, and his restrained expressions.

“Akaba Reiji. You’re his dad who disappeared from the hospital.”

Shun had forgotten his name, or if Akaba had even told it to him. But he knew he was right in a moment. The man’s lips parted and his eyes widened. He almost dropped the syringe, and he had to lean back before he fell over, bracing himself on his knees.

“Reiji?” he said, voice cracking slightly. “You know Reiji?”

“He’s the one who got us here,” Shun said. “He had a tracker we planted on one of the targets, and it let us here.”

The man looked completely stricken, thrown off balance. His tanned face had lost significant color, and he pressed a hand to his mouth.

“No,” he mumbled into his palm. “He can’t be here. If he’s here...”

The man swallowed tightly, closing his eyes shut and taking a deep breath. Shun softened, just slightly.  _ That’s right _ , he thought.  _ His daughter...she was the first victim. He’s probably worried about losing another kid. _

The man took another moment to seemingly steady himself. Then he dropped his hand from his mouth. He held his hand out towards Shun, and Shun stared at it.

“Give me your arm,” he said. “If you are here with Reiji, then you must be an ally. I will want you to be functional.”

Shun glowered at him again. The boy with the glasses beside him leveled a similarly suspicious look, but the other boy looked anxious.

“Is that really medicine?” he asked. “It looks weird.”

A faint flicker of... _ something _ passed through the man’s eyes, and Shun frowned. But the man didn’t even look at the boy, or acknowledge he had spoken. Shun stared up at him, eyes narrow. He tried to search his eyes, figure out if he could read him. He couldn’t. He really was like his kid.

But if Shun was sure this was Reiji’s dad, then he could also be pretty sure that his murderous intent was saved for the cult. He sighed, and held out his arm.  _ Things can’t get any worse. _

The man pushed Shun’s sleeve back, and carefully poked him with the needle, inserting the yellow liquid. Shun didn’t feel anything as the man removed it and stepped back, tossing the syringe into a nearby cracked garbage can.

“You’re an idiot,” the glasses kid said.

Shun glared at him — he didn’t need to hear that from whoever the hell this was.

“My name is Akaba Leo,” the man said, as he walked back to his table and began rifling through his suitcase again. “And you?”

Shun hesitated a moment. His head was actually starting to feel a little bit better. Was that the placebo effect, or was this shit actually working? It couldn’t be that fast, could it?

“Kurosaki Shun.”

“I’m Yugo!” said the boy on Shun’s left. “And that’s Yuuri!”

The glasses boy’s lips curled, and he shot a glare at Yugo.

Leo made a soft grunt of understanding.

“Ah, that’s right. One of the victims was also called Kurosaki.”

Shun’s anxiety shot immediately through the roof. He shot to his feet, and was surprised to find that he was holding his place easily, without any dizziness. He lurched forward, grabbing the man’s shoulder.

“What do you mean, ‘victim’?” he yelled. “She’s not —”

“Calm yourself,” said Leo, narrowing his eyes at Shun. “Two of their vessels are here. They can’t perform a ritual with all of their pieces, and not until midnight, at any rate. It’s not yet even eleven pm.”

Huh? Wait, that couldn’t be right. They’d gotten here at like ten thirty, hadn’t they? Shun didn’t have his phone on him, so he couldn’t confirm. He still remained tense, however, until Leo shoved his hand off of his shoulder and moved over to the moth-eaten bed, rifling through a second suitcase.

“You seem to know an awful lot about all of this,” Shun said, curling his hands into fists.

“Perhaps you could explain what’s going on?” Yuuri said, folding his arms.

Leo didn’t even look up from his suitcase. He lifted a second gun out of this one, hefting it and sighting along the end. Shun tensed, but the gun didn’t come anywhere near him.

“I know about it because I was present for their last attempt,” he said. “Last time,  _ I _ was the vessel.”

Yugo let out a little squeak. Shun’s eyes narrowed.

“Explain that to me,” he said. “Akaba said this was a cult, but I don’t know anything about it, or what they’re doing.”

Leo put the gun back down, and began taking ammunition out of the case, lining it up on the bed.

“The Church of Daemons is an ancient cult that goes back for centuries,” he said. “Their goal is to learn the secrets of the daemon plane, and manipulate those secrets for their own use. Their end goal is to summon the greatest of all demons, and bind him — making him a weapon for their use.”

Yuuri snorted.

“Are you  _ serious _ ?” he said. “I’ve read about some... _ interesting _ cults in my time, but actually  _ believing _ in summoning  _ demons _ ?”

For the first time, Leo seemed to acknowledge the boys’ presence in the room. He leveled his gaze at Yuuri, and something passed over his eyes, something that made Yuuri frown and lean back slightly, as though he were  _ considering  _ taking a step back.

“Demons are real,” Leo said flatly. “The last time they attempted to summon this one, I was meant to be the vessel for it. I  _ felt _ it. I watched them  _ cut _ my daughter’s throat and bleed her into the stone, and then I felt the horrid beast drawn by her blood try to  _ stuff _ itself inside of me.”

Shun’s instincts screamed at him suddenly. There was an edge to the man’s voice that hadn’t been there before. He edged, imperceptibly, towards the two Yuto lookalikes, moving himself slightly in between them and him.

“Besides,” Leo said, glancing at Shun. “I believe you’ve seen some of their handiwork already, judging by your injuries.”

Shun’s mind shot back to that  _ thing _ in the woods. An involuntary shudder shook him, and he gripped at his arm with one hand.

“Are you trying to tell me that thing is a...a what? A demon?”

“It’s  _ many _ demons,” Leo said. “They call it the Repository.”

“What? What are we talking about?” Yugo said, his voice tinged with nerves. The floor creaked under his feet as he stepped slightly forward, trying to lean into the conversation.

Shun fixed his eyes on Leo, ignoring Yugo. If this guy knew what that thing was, he might know how to deal with it — if Shun was going to get Yuto, Ruri, Yuya, and the others out of here safely, he was going to need to know how to kill it. 

Leo looked back down at his arsenal, and began to methodically load bullets into his new gun. Shun took a slight step forward, trying to get his attention back.

“I suspect they’ve been practicing this time,” Leo said. “After their attempt last time  _ killed _ most of them, they decided to practice by summoning many smaller demons. And those need a place to go. So they put them all inside of  _ that _ thing.”

Shun’s skin crawled. That was —  _ crazy _ . There was no way that was true. Demons weren’t real. Whatever that thing had been was just some crazy...genetic experiment, or something. Or a robot, or a solid light projection, or...something other than what this man was implying.

“How do we beat it?” he said.

Leo snorted.

“Are you an ordained priest or a Buddhist monk? An esper?”

“What? No.”

“Then you don’t. You stay out of its way.”

Shun stared at him. Leo didn’t look back. He sighted along his gun again, seemingly testing the weight, then put it back down and went to retrieve his shotgun. He brought it back to the other suitcase and began to load that one.

“Well if they’re so good at demon summoning that they can put hundreds of demons into one person,” Yuuri said, with a clear edge of sarcasm to his voice, “then why do they need  _ us _ ? And four of us? For one demon? Your story is full of holes.”

That was a good point, Shun thought, frowning. He hadn’t even thought of it. Why four people for one demon, if that’s what these crazies thought they were doing? And why four girls when last time it seemed they’d only taken one? Leo didn’t respond right away, checking his shotgun.

Then his eyes flickered to Yuuri. Then to Yugo. And finally, to Shun.

“Last time they failed,” he said. “They’re being absolutely certain this time that they don’t make a mistake.”

Then he turned the gun towards Yuuri, cocked it back, and shot.

Yuuri’s eyes bulged. His mouth opened in a wide, shocked “o”. He stumbled back one step, and then hit the table and almost lost his footing. Yugo choked on a scream. A red, dark spot began to form against his chest as he pressed one hand, almost disbelieving, against it.

Yugo started towards him, and Leo swung the aim of his gun towards his head. 

Shun snapped back into focus. He launched himself at the man’s arm, dragging it down. He felt the heat of the gun discharge as the shot went into the floor, but Leo was bigger than Shun and much stronger than he should have been for someone who had been in the hospital for six years. Leo smacked Shun back like a ragdoll. Shun bounced off the nearest wall, and his eyes caught on the second gun on the bed. 

Shun had never held a gun in his life, much less fired one. But he  _ had _ had a short-lived high school baseball career. He grabbed it by the barrel and swung like he was trying to smack that linedrive right into that stupid pitcher’s face which had gotten him kicked off the team.

Leo had been too busy trying to take aim at Yugo again, not paying attention to Shun. The butt of the gun crashed into the side of his head and he grunted — his shot went wild and into the wall.

“What the hell are you doing?” Shun yelled, cranking back for another blow. “You said you didn’t want anymore people to die!”

“No more innocent people,” Leo said, swinging his gun towards Shun. “They are not innocent.”

Shun struck his makeshift bat into Leo’s wrist, sending another shot into the ceiling. Shun wheeled his bat back in the other direction immediately, striking Leo hard on the other side of the head. Leo dropped his shot gun and grabbed Shun’s weapon on his next swing. He tried to yank it from Shun’s hand — Shun let him, letting go and bolting forward at once with both hands thrust out, palms forward. Leo’s center of gravity staggered backwards as the gun came out of Shun’s hands with less resistance than anticipated, and it was enough for Shun to slam him backwards so that he went straight to the ground.  _ Years _ of street fighting instincts kicked in, and Shun followed Leo down onto the floor.

He landed hard with his knees into the man’s stomach, wailing both fists into his face as hard as he could.

Leo managed to cross his arms over his face, catching most of the blows against the blade of his arms. After a few seconds, he lurched upwards, snacking Shun off of him like he was nothing more than a fly. Shun tumbled backwards on to the ground, thrusting his own arms in front of his face.

He heard the cock of a gun and froze, peering over the tops of his arms.

Leo had the gun trained on him now, his face flushed and shoulders heaving. He was gonna have a bad black eye judging by the developing bruise — Shun could take some comfort in knowing he’d at least been a nuisance.

“Are you crazy?” Shun shouted at him, hoping to keep his eyes off the Yuto lookalikes for a moment longer. “They  _ are _ innocent!”

“They are the only ones capable of hosting that beast,” Leo gasped. “The cult will never stop trying. But if their pieces are gone, the world — Ray — I can make sure it never happens again —”

He kicked Shun hard in the chest, causing him to snap back into the bed and crack his head against the bedframe. He was briefly stunned, long enough for Leo to turn his gun back towards —

Leo swore. A horrible, angry sound ripped out of him. Shun tried to look through the stars flaring in his eyes, turning blindly towards the other side of the room.

The suitcase of Leo’s syringes and vials was dumped onto the floor as though someone had knocked it over in their haste to get away. More importantly, however, the door to the motel hung open. 

The only sign that the two of them had been there were the little drops of blood trailing out of the room.

* * *

Rin wasn’t particularly out of shape. She ran every morning at four in the morning, and was constantly lifting things at work and at the garage with Yugo. But her heart felt like a white hot iron in her chest that was leaking out her throat, and she wasn’t sure how much longer she could run before her legs simply gave out underneath her.

Yuzu lagged even worse than her, stumbling and catching her feet on notches in the wood at every other step. It kept almost dragging Rin backwards, but she kept a tight grip on Yuzu’s arm, and kept moving.

She didn’t hear anyone pursuing them anymore, but she wasn’t about to stop yet — 

“R-Rin!” Yuzu gasped. “R-Rin, we’re...we’re not being...followed...anymore.”

It was like a switch going off in Rin’s brain, and her knees gave out. She immediately skidded to a stop and collapsed in the same motion, curling up against the worn wooden floor and trying to suck thick, hot breaths into her fiery lungs. Yuzu had still been in her grip when she fell, so she tumbled forward too, landing on her hands and knees beside her and gasping just as desperately.

They sat there for a moment, trying to breathe.

“Do you think...Ruri...is okay?” Yuzu gasped.

Rin laid there, breathing. She thought about the whirl of Ruri’s hair and the flash of her eyes as she’d yelled at them to run. She remembered how even when Ruri shook in the face of their captors yelling, screaming, and waving tasers in their faces, she’d always maintained a quiet sense of strength, even as silent tears rolled down her face — she’d still looked like somewhere inside her she was calm.

“I think she’s probably better off than we are right now,” Rin gasped out finally. “But...but we either need to find her, or the guys, or our way out.”

Yuzu took a few more deep breaths. Then she gasped. Rin rolled up to a sitting position, heart picking up speed again. But Yuzu’s eyes were above them, staring at the doors.

“What?” Rin hissed. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Yuzu said, scrambling to her feet. “Look!”

She poked one finger at the number plaque on one of the doors. Rin frowned at the 020 Yuzu gestured at, not getting what she was putting down.

“It’s a lower number than where we started!” Yuzu said, eyes lighting up. “If this is a motel, then —”

It dawned on Rin, and she leaped to her own feet.

“Then we must be near the exit,” she said. “Let’s go!”

A giddy laugh coiled in Rin’s chest as she thought about seeing a _door_ out of this place — of course, she wasn’t leaving with Yugo, but as soon as they knew where the exit was, they’d be in a much better position! And then maybe they could call for help!

She seized Yuzu’s hand, and the two of them began walking as fast as their exhausted bodies would let them. Yuzu flicked her eyes from one number plate to the next, counting down under her breath.

“15....14....13...12....”

They turned another corner, and Rin’s heart quickened. This had to be the hall that led to the lobby, right? It looked the same as the others, but there had to be a way out somewhere. Rin scanned around for some sign of double doors, or maybe a door at the far end of the hall that would lead out.

“7...6...5...”

Yuzu stopped dead, her hand squeezing Rin’s. She stared up at the numbers.

“What?” Rin demanded. 

She followed Yuzu’s horrified gaze up, and something cold crawled into her chest.

_417_.

“N...no that can’t be right,” Yuzu said, her hand tightening on Rin’s. She put a hand to her mouth, and Rin could see the shake in her body. “I saw that number — back where we escaped —”

“Yuzu! Pull it together!” Rin demanded, seizing her by the shoulders. “Hey, look at me!”

Yuzu’s eyes were so wide it was like the whites of her eyes were trying to swallow up her irises, but she looked at Rin. Rin held her gaze firmly.

“This place is clearly old as shit,” she said. “There must have just been a mistake, okay? We’ll keep going. One room at a time, we’ll just keep checking them until we find our friends, or our way out. Okay?”

Yuzu looked like she was getting ready to collapse in a heap of tears, but Rin squeezed her shoulders tightly. Yuzu swallowed, and she nodded wordlessly.

“Great!” Rin said, clapping her shoulders and putting on a bravado she didn’t feel. “Now let’s —”

The floor shook. Rin swayed slightly, frowning. Both of them looked at the floor. It shook again. Rin lifted her eyes up to the wall beside them, with the door that read _417_. It shook again, and Rin finally recognized what that sound reminded her of — like something punching through a distant wall, getting closer — 

The wall exploded. Yuzu shrieked, Rin threw her hands over her face to block the rain of wooden chips that cascaded down her face, and something _massive_ lurched through the wreckage. Rin choked on the rain of dust in her mouth and eyes, staggering back. Yuzu — where’d Yuzu go?

Rin’s eyes lifted up.

And she screamed.

The creature was — the only word she could use were _massive_ and _grotesque._ It barely fit in the hallway, hunched over like a gorilla with the long, meaty arms dragging against the ground to match. Blood stained almost all of its body, leaking from the entry points of the deadly looking metal spikes and strips of metal that had been hammered into its mangled flesh. A huge, human-esque flat face turned slowly towards the sound of her feet scrabbling backwards, and she saw twisted scars dug into the flesh of its face, white hair cut almost to the base of its head. One eye was _gone_, and the other glowed red. It twisted in its socket towards her.

A huge, flat-toothed smile split across its face like a scar. It reached for her.

Rin leaped backwards, just before the trash-can sized hand closed around her. It stared at its hand for a moment as though confused. Then its eye began to glow even brighter, and it started _drooling_. Rin almost threw up.

The creature turned awkwardly in the thin hallways, lurching towards her. Then Rin heard a soft thunk, and it stopped. It turned its head over its shoulder.

Just around the creature’s body, filling the whole hallway, Rin could see a white faced Yuzu. Yuzu snatched up another piece of broke wood from the floor and flung it as hard as she could at the monster’s head. It began to turn towards her. No way!!

“Hey!” Rin shouted at it, waving her arms up and down. “Over here, you — you big stupid lunk!”

_Oh holy shit what is happening what is this thing what is going on I’m gonna go into shock in a second here — _

Rin bit back the panicked thoughts and started walking backwards, still shouting and waving her arms. Yuzu kept throwing things as she, too, walked backwards in the other direction, but she didn’t seem capable of making sound. The creature looked slowly back and forth between them, trying to decide, it seemed, which one to chase.

“Come and get me!!” Rin shrieked. “Come and get me you piece of —”

Faster than she had thought possible from its appearance, it lunged for her. She screamed, leaping backwards, and then, unable to think of doing anything, else, she turned and bolted.

_Follow me please follow me don’t go after Yuzu oh my god if it goes after Yuzu I have to try and chase it instead_ — 

She didn’t dare look behind her but the world shook from the creature loping after her — how fast was it, could she outrun it? Was she strong enough, did she have enough energy, was she going to — 

The floor shook, creaked, groaned from the movement of the beast and beneath her own feet and she ran and ran and ran —

Her heel hit the floor, and punched straight through it. She shrieked — she imagined a moment getting stuck, like Yuzu, one leg trapped in the floor with this monster bearing down on her, ready to crush her — 

And then the entire floor sank under her feet and her stomach lurched as the whole of her plummeted down into the darkness. Distantly, she saw the light above her close off as the creature loomed over it. Oh, fuck, now she was going to die from a fall instead of from a monster — 

She struck against something that gave, something that _oofed_, and crumpled on top of something that crumpled underneath her. Someone gasped and another someone _uugghhed_, but Rin could barely hear over the sound of her blood rushing in her ears. Her mind blanked for a moment, and she laid there, arms sprawled, and not comprehending that the thing underneath her was warm and squirmy until it crashed on her all at once and she thought _oh fuck no I landed in the middle of a CULT — _

“Y-Yuzu??”

The voice was familiar, and yet it wasn’t. Hands grasped underneath her shoulder, carefully pulling her up and off whatever she had fallen on. A blurry face appeared in her field of vision.

She choked.

“Yugo?” she whispered.


	12. Chapter 12

There was nothing they could do except keep going.

There was no sign of Selena in pursuit, or really... _ anyone _ in this big, empty motel. Yuya shivered. The thick layer of dust over the floor indicated no one had been here in years, maybe even decades. 

“We might be going in too deep,” Yuya said, looking behind him to see that he was leaving actual footprints in the dust. “If the cult hasn’t been here, this might be the opposite way from the exit.”

Yuto nodded, looking uncertainly over his shoulder as well. Almost as an afterthought, he ground one of his footprints out of sight. 

“I definitely don’t hear anything in any of the rooms,” he said. For the last hallway and a half, he’d been pressing his ear to each door, and trying the handles to see if anything or anyone was inside. “They probably aren’t keeping the girls here.”

Yuya nodded, too, but he couldn’t think of any other options. Going back the other way meant they would probably run into Selena, and whatever her strange voice could do to them. His hair stood on end just thinking about it. He felt  _ cold _ . Shivering, he rubbed at his arms and wished he’d been wearing a jacket when he was kidnapped.

“Is it just me, or is it getting colder?” Yuto said.

Yuya hesitated, swinging his glance towards Yuto. So feeling colder wasn’t just his own imagination?

“I was just thinking that,” he said, shivering again.

Yuto peered nervously down the hallway. Yuya did too, though he wasn’t sure what they were going to see. Half the lights were out in this hall, and cobwebs were getting more and more common across the ceiling, swaying slightly in the breeze of their movements.

Yuya flinched then when he felt the air move across his face, cold as a ghost. Why was the air  _ moving _ in here? Yuto shuddered too, taking a step back. It wasn’t as though it were a gust, more of a distant puff of air — but it was just as out of place all the same. 

“It’s coming from that way,” Yuto said. “Do...you think it might be a way out?”

Yuya sincerely doubted it, but what other choices were there? He nodded uncertainly, and the pair of them carefully made their way in the direction of the breeze.

It breathed across them a few more times, like air whispering through a half-cracked window. Maybe it  _ was _ a window, Yuya dared to hope for just a moment.

Then they reached the end of the hallway, and the source appeared before them — a door at the very end that hung slightly open. No light shone from inside, but it creaked ever so slightly open and then settled again from another breeze.

Yuya and Yuto stopped at the same time, and exchanged a glance. 

“It might be a way out,” Yuya said.

“Or a way deeper in, and more trapped,” said Yuto.

Yuya nodded, hugging his arms closer to his chest. They both stared at the door again.

Yuto swallowed. Then he stepped forward, and carefully eased the door open.

They stared down at an old, wooden staircase that led down into a deep darkness. Another faint gust of cold air wafted up from the bottom, but it didn’t smell like the outside. It smelled old and dusty, like a room left empty of human touch for many years.

“I don’t like this,” Yuto said, holding tight to the door handle. “I think we should just turn around.

Yuya was about to agree when he heard something else — the soft sound of voices in the distance. He grabbed Yuto’s arm, looking quickly back over his shoulder. At the end of the hallway, the faint muffled sound of voices without words wafted around the corner, growing clearer as they grew closer.

_ “Footprints...close...get the....vessels...” _

“They’re right behind us,” Yuya said.

Yuto swore. The pair of them hesitated one more moment, staring down into the darkness. Yuya swallowed, grabbed Yuto’s wrist, and tugged him down the stairs, turning to shut it quickly behind them. He fumbled in the sudden pitch blackness for the handle and found a lock — he quickly twisted it shut.

For one more moment, the pair of them stood dead still in the dark, hovering on the stairs.

“Should we wait for them to pass?” Yuto asked.

“No, they might have keys or something,” Yuya said. “I don’t like going lower any more than you do but —”

A half remembered phrase danced through his mind, something about the devil you knew versus the one you didn’t. He couldn’t remember which one was supposed to be worse. But at this point, he’d do whatever it took to keep himself and the others out of the cult’s hands — if only knowing that without their vessels, they couldn’t kill Yuzu and the others.

Yuto squeezed his hand, though whether it was for Yuya’s reassurance or his own, Yuya wasn’t sure. But he squeezed it back, and then, carefully and quietly, began to feel his way down to the next step.

The steps creaked and groaned and Yuya bit back a swear. The cultists might hear them! Yuto clung to Yuya’s hand, feeling his way down after him. It was too  _ dark _ . Yuya had no means of lighting the way; they’d taken his phone. But he kept his free hand to the wall and felt down one step after another.

The dark made it easy for his mind to wander. He tried to keep hold of it, but it was too late. He was already thinking about Yuzu, and where she might be — if she was as scared as he was; if she’d managed to escape, if she’d met the other kidnappers, or if worse things had happened that he was scared to name. He thought about Reiji and Kurosaki and how stupid this plan was after all, if they were all right, if they’d been caught, if Yuya’s stupid, reckless idea had already gotten them killed.

_ Shut up _ ! he told his brain.

But it just kept pounding as they got lower and lower, and instead of thoughts, really, it was more of a buzz, like a distant chanting heard through a door at the end of a long hallway but clattering around in his head. His breaths tightened, and his chest got stiff — 

“Y-Yuya, do you hear that?”

Yuto’s voice seemed to break the spell. Yuya snapped out of his thoughts and he stopped on the stairs, gasping for breath. He felt suddenly very dizzy.

Yuto’s hand clung to his, and Yuya came back to himself, trying to listen for what Yuto could hear. But all he could hear was that weird, thumping slash chanting sound that seemed to be coming from somewhere inside him, that might just be his own heartbeat.

“Hear what?” he asked.

Yuto shifted in the dark, tightening his grip on Yuya’s hand.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s like...like a thump-thump-thump in my head. But it’s not my heartbeat. It’s lower than that, like a voice too far away to hear the words of.”

Yuya’s heart quickened, and the thumping in his head continued at the exact same rate. Yuto was right, it wasn’t his heartbeat. He looked back down the staircase, even though he couldn’t make sense of anything in the dark.

It was then he realized that it actually wasn’t that pitch black after all. He squinted, frowning at the faintest of lights coming from far below them. Clinging to Yuto’s hand, he started descending towards it. The pounding in his head didn’t stop, but it didn’t get any louder, either — the light, however, grew a little bit stronger, strong enough for Yuya to make out just the tiniest bit of the stairs’ edges.

They finally came to the end of the stairs, stepping down onto a concrete floor. Yuya squinted towards the faint light.

A cool, red light emanated from thin tubes along the edges of the floor, not bright enough to ruin someone’s night vision but enough for one to see what was in here. It wasn’t a huge room, maybe about the size of two dorms, with tables and bookshelves along each wall, and a ceiling so high that Yuya couldn’t see the it in the dark. Another door, big and metal, stood at the opposite end of the room.

Yuto’s hand slipped out of Yuya’s as he leaned towards one of the tables, frowning at the papers scattered across it. Yuya rubbed the heel of his hand into his temples. The pounding was getting more annoying than painful now, and he just wished it would stop.

“What is this place?” he asked, hoping the sound of his voice might disturb the sound in his head.

“I think...it’s some kind of research facility,” said Yuto, leafing through papers. “Take a look at this.”

He pushed some papers towards Yuya, and Yuya leaned in. He frowned, looking down at the strange squiggles, carefully drawn circles with geometric shapes drawn inside them, characters that didn’t look like Japanese, or any other language, really. Yuto flipped the page, and Yuya shivered. This was a drawing of a large man, circuit-like designs drawn over his skin and notations in a difficult to read hand marked in the margins.

“I can’t read any of this,” Yuya said, taking the page and squinting. This, at least, was written in Japanese, but it was so messy and small he could barely make out a handful of words. He saw something that said  _ surgery _ and felt sick.

“There’s so much of this stuff,” Yuto said, moving over to the nearest bookshelf and pulling one off. He squinted at the spine, and then the title, which was written in English, but not words that Yuya knew.

“Ne...necro...nomicon?” Yuto tried to sound it out. “Ugh. Ruri’s better than me at English.”

“Is this one in French?” Yuya asked, grabbing another book and flipping it open. He stuck his tongue out slightly at the dark ink drawings of strange creatures inside, one like an owl with legs as long as a flamingo’s, and eyes bigger than dinner plates, another that was nothing more than a hulking mass of ooze. “No, maybe...Italian?”

“I think you’re right about them being a demon cult,” Yuto said, poring over another book and squinting at the pictures. “I can’t really read these, but they all seem to be about demons. Look, this one even has some kind of summoning circle.”

Yuya’s heart quickened. If this was where the cult did their research...it might have some evidence they could use to prove what was happening here. Or, even better, something they might be able to use to defend themselves!

“Maybe we can try and figure out what it is they’re doing here,” Yuya said excitedly. “And then we can figure out how to ruin it!”

Yuto’s eyes lit up. He snapped the book shut and shoved it back on the shelf, moving over to one of the other tables and beginning to dig around in the papers. Yuya moved to another table, shifting through them for anything that might make sense.

“Look at this one!”

Yuto waved a sheaf over his head, and Yuya turned towards him. Yuto’s eyes were glued to it, squinting at some of the smaller letters.

“What is it?” Yuya asked.

“It looks like a translation,” said Yuto. “I can’t read the first lines, but there’s some crossed out Japanese underneath it and a lot of notes. Says something about...about ‘the bringer of....of the end’. ‘How to call upon the bringer of the end.’”

That sounded super ominous. Yuya hugged himself as he listened, chancing a glance towards the stairs. He wondered if anyone was going to suddenly come down the stairs. Clearly this was an important room...

“Something, something...god, this person has terrible handwriting. ‘Offer to him...to them..?’ They’ve crossed out a bunch, I think they’re trying to find a better translation. ‘Offer up the blood of...the one whose voice reaches across the many realms. The...the scent...’ ugh the rest of that is all scribbled over. See if you can make anything out, I’ll keep looking.”

Yuto passed the sheaf to Yuya. The paper was crumpled on the edges, as though someone had handled it roughly, and it smelled faintly of cigarette smoke. He wrinkled his nose and tried to read. 

_Offer up to __him them__ it the __soul__ blood of __the one__ she whose voice reaches across __many realms__ the veil. The scent shall_ (and here it was so inkstained it was impossible to read). _He__ It who (can hear?) hears the sound of __its__ her rending soul (?) shall __be filled__ have the spirit of endings arrive within them._

_ _ Yuya’s mind rang for a moment with the weird things that Selena had said to them back in the room.

_ “You can hear my voice when it crosses the other side.” _

He shivered. Everything made even less sense than before. What did any of this mean?

“Hey, this looks important,” said Yuto.

Yuya started to look up from the page, to where Yuto slowly turned around, eyes glued to a new page. Some dust swirled down from above, and Yuya’s eyes flickered up.

The ceiling broke open and a shriek tumbled after the thing that plummeted through the sudden gaping hole of distant light. Yuto’s head snapped up — and the thing slammed right into him, sending them both to the floor with  _ thwump _ .

“Yuto!” Yuya cried, throwing the paper aside and rushing towards him.

The thing that had landed on him was person shaped, and simply laid there for a moment — for just a breath, Yuya’s stomach lurched as he imagined seeing a corpse was laying there — but then the girl coughed, her chest rattling, and her fingers twitched. 

Yuya gasped, eyes widening. H-he knew that face.

“Y-Yuzu?” he gasped.

The girl squinted, wincing. Her bangs flipped between her eyes, choppily cut hanks of short hair poofing about her shoulders. She squinted up at him.

“Yu..Yugo?” she gasped.

Yuto groaned, squirming underneath her weight as Yuya’s heart briefly sunk. This wasn’t Yuzu — it must be one of the other girls. He leaped forward, taking her gently by the arms and lifting her up and off of Yuto. Yuto coughed, pushing himself up to his hands and knees.

“Oh, shit, are you okay?” the girl said, looking dizzy. She patted at Yuya’s face a moment, frowning. “You’re...not Yugo.”

“No, sorry,” Yuya said. “My name is Yuya. That’s Yuto you just fell on.”

The girl blinked with surprise.

“Yuto? Oh wait — Ruri’s friend?”

Yuto coughed again, but he forced himself shakily to a sitting position.

“Ruri?” he said. “You know where Ruri is??”

“Not...right now, at the moment,” the girl said. “Sorry.”

Yuto’s face fell. She turned around towards him, seeming to get her breath back. She frowned at him, looking confused as she looked back and forth between him and Yuya.

“This is weird,” she said. “You guys look just like him.”

“Tell me about it,” said Yuya. 

Yuto shook his head, as though to dislodge the shakes from having been fallen on. Yuya looked towards the ceiling, and could see the distant, dim light from the motel above. How deep  _ were _ they?

“You must be Rin,” Yuto said. “Yugo talks about you a lot.”

“Is he okay?” Rin said, leaning forward with concern. 

“We got separated — but he ended up with Yuuri, and he seems cautious enough. They should be fine,” said Yuya.

The soft pounding in his head, so constant that he’d almost forgotten it, suddenly spiked, and he groaned. Yuto winced too, grinding the heels of his palms into his temples. Rin jumped, leaning forward with her hands outstretched.

“Are you guys okay?? What’s wrong?” she said.

“You don’t hear that?” said Yuya. It was definitely  _ chanting _ , he thought. The sound of monotonous voices all tumbling over each other, steady and constant.

“Hear what?”

“The...the pounding. Chanting.”

She looked horrified, so he was assuming she did not. The sound began to fade back to its original, constant drone again, and Yuya was able to relax slightly.

“Where are we?” Rin asked, hands still outstretched. “And are you guys  _ okay _ ?”

“We’ll have to manage,” Yuto said through grit teeth. “Yuya, this is what I was trying to show you before.”

He pushed the paper at Yuya, and Yuya stared at it. It looked like another sigil, a bunch of straight lines all twisting over each other like a mandala.

“What is this?” Yuya asked.

“A map,” said Yuto. “Of tunnels. All underneath the motel.”

“What??” Rin said.

“Do you think there’s a way out?” Yuya said.

“I can’t tell, but maybe if we keep looking around here for more information and clues...”

“You just stay on your butt and get your bearings back,” Rin said, in a tone that brooked for no argument, standing up easily as though she hadn’t just fallen at least twenty feet. “Tell me where to start looking for shit.”

* * *

“Put them down!” Reiji shouted, throwing himself again against the hands that held him. 

He was shoved back down with even more force, a hand shoving at the back of his head and almost bowing him over, pulling his arms harshly behind him. Reira screamed again, kicking and wailing uselessly against their captor.

“Silence the child,” the lead cultist said, and for a moment, Reiji almost screamed.

All Reira’s captor did, however, was stuff cloth into Reira’s mouth to quiet their screaming. Reiji struggled again — he froze, however, when the lead cultist drew a blade from inside his cloak, and passed it to the man holding Reira.

“Don’t!!” Reiji shouted, his voice cracking. “Don’t —”

“Oh, don’t be so upset,” the man said with a cruel smile. “I have no intentions of murdering the poor child — not unless you refuse to cooperate.”

Reira froze in place as the blade was placed gently to their neck, frozen tears hovering at the corners of their eyes. Reiji couldn’t breathe — but he also stopped struggling.

“Excellent,” the man said, and Reiji’s head was yanked back suddenly by his hair, forced to look up at the odious face. “I do love quick learners.”

A boiling hot rage began to bubble in Reiji’s stomach. He knew it, then, implicitly — this man was responsible for Ray’s murder. And if Reiji didn’t do something soon, he would be responsible for Reira’s as well. A hatred unlike anything Reiji had ever known coursed within him.

The man almost seemed to notice this, his eyes narrowing and head tilting slightly. He stepped towards Reiji, leaning down inches from his face. It was then that Reiji realized he  _ knew _ this face. Jean-Michel Roget — he was a  _ politician _ . Reiji had seen his face in the newspapers. And here he was, wreathed in black robes and having a knife held to a ten year old.

Roget grabbed him by the chin, then, forcing Reiji to look at him, turning him back and forth. A surprised smirk tugged at the edge of the his lips as he let Reiji go.

“Well, well, well,” he said softly. “Perhaps it’s not a coincidence that two traveled just  _ happened _ to arrive at our little motel. You aren’t simply lost, are you?”

Reiji pressed his lips together and said nothing. Roget only smiled wider.

“I would know that face anywhere,” he said, shaking his head. “Well, well, well, Akaba Reiji. Let me guess — you’ve come seeking revenge for your bitch of a sister.”

It took everything Reiji had not to try and lunge forward at that. His hatred frothed like a stormy sea.

“It’s unfortunate you’ve come now,” Roget said with a sigh. “If only your precious little research foray into us had led you here sooner. I would have enjoyed using you as a test subject.”

“And what’s so different about tonight?” Reiji said through grit teeth.

Roget opened his mouth, and then closed it, smiling as he shook his head.

“Ah-ah-ah. Trying to get me to talk to save you, hm? Very clever, as I do love explaining things. But we haven’t the time.  _ You’ll _ be doing the talking tonight.”

He clasped his hands behind his back and leaned forward, smiling at Reiji as someone might at a particularly amusing child. Reiji bristled.

“You will answer me quickly, and truthfully,” he said. “Or you will bear the heavy burden of a second sibling dying under a knife.”

Reira whimpered through their gag, the knife pressing a little closer to their throat. Reiji shot Reira a look that he hoped, desperately, was reassuring. Then he turned his angry gaze back to Roget.

“I don’t know what you expect me to tell you,” he said through a tight jaw. “I only just found this place. I have no idea what you’re doing here.”

“No, I think perhaps you know something,” Roget said with a smile. “You see, we’re missing a few important pieces here tonight. And I don’t think you’re the only one to have broken in. What can you tell me about that?”

_ Kurosaki _ . Reiji tried to keep his face neutral. He must have already made it inside after Reiji had gone after Reira. Had he already found the prisoners?

Reira was in danger, but...but if Reiji told the truth about Kurosaki, he could be putting him, Yuya, Yuzu, and all of them in danger, too.

“If that’s true, I don’t know about it,” Reiji said as evenly as possible. “I came alone.”

Roget watched his eyes for a long moment, and Reiji did not drop the gaze. He wasn’t an actor, but people had always told him he was difficult to read. He was betting on that now. Roget sighed.

“Cut one of the child’s fingers off.”

Reira screamed into his gag, struggling again as two robed figures tried to wrestle one of their arms to the knife’s blade. Reiji yelled, throwing himself against the hands grabbing him. Reira was wrestled to the floor and pinned down, one arm pinned sprawled to the ground and the knife turned towards their hand.

“No!  _ No _ ! Don’t hurt them, I —”

“I told you there would be consequences for lying.”

“I wasn’t — ”

The blade glittered cruelly in the light and Reira’s tears rolled down their face and Reiji — Reiji broke.

“All right, all right! There’s only one other, there’s one other here, he’s the only one, I didn’t call anyone, please, just don’t hurt — don’t hurt Reira,  _ please _ —”

Roget raised a hand, and the knife stopped on its movement. Roget stared at Reiji, all smiles gone now.

“Are you telling the truth, now?” he said. “I won’t give you another chance.”

“I’m telling the truth, I  _ swear _ , it’s only me and one other, we were separated in the woods and I don’t know where he is now, but I  _ swear _ that’s the truth!”

Reiji  _ hated _ himself. He hated the sudden rush of tears that had flooded to his eyes, only barely held back. He hated himself for the show of emotion in front of  _ him _ . He hated himself for not being able to protect Kurosaki and the others, for breaking down, for not being able to hide his emotions as well as he thought he could.

Roget smiled ever so slightly.

“I do believe he is telling the truth this time,” he said. “Very well. One other unwanted guest. That is easily taken care of.”

He chuckled softly.

“I’m surprised at you, coming with such little planning. I had thought the acting CEO of Leo Corporation would be a little smarter.”

Reiji glared at him, fighting back the lump of tears in his throat. Roget clucked his tongue, and turned back to one copse of silent, waiting robed figures as he dug in his pocket.

“We’re wasting time. There’s only...” He looked at his watch, and frowned, eyebrows furrowing. He shook his head, and put it back into his pocket. “There’s not much time before the ritual.”

Reiji’s mind whirled. He remembered the frozen clock in his car, and on his phone. That look on Roget’s face when he’d looked at his watch, the way that he’d altered what he was about to say about how long they had.

_ It wasn’t just me. Time isn’t moving. _

“Kill them both. Burn the bodies.”

Reiji’s mind whited out for just a moment. He yelled again, trying to throw himself against the hands that held him. Reira tried to squirm, but the knife was coming back to their head again and Reiji almost  _ broke _ with the panic — 

“Wait!” Reiji shouted. “Wait! The time! You saw it! It’s not moving, is it?”

Roget held up his hand sharply again, eyes shooting to Reiji. His gaze narrowed slightly.

“What are you talking about?”

Reiji didn’t waste time waiting to regain his breath; he knew that only for as long as he held Roget’s attention, only for as long as he made himself worth something, could he secure his and Reira’s safety.

“The time. It’s only 10:35, isn’t it? Time isn’t moving. I thought it was simply my own clock, or that perhaps that your people were putting out some kind of jammer, but your analog watch isn’t moving forward either, is it?”

Roget’s eyes narrowed further.

“And what of it?”

“You can’t perform your ritual until a certain time, correct? If time isn’t moving —”

“So timepieces aren’t working,” Roget snapped. “Time itself still moves. The moon shall come to the correct place.”

“Or will it?” Reiji shot back. “What are the chances that at least three sources of timekeeping are frozen at the same time? Something else is going on here, perhaps something you don’t know either.”

“Get to your point.”

“I can figure out what is happening. I can find a way to fix it.”

Reiji hated himself for the words coming out of his mouth, for offering to help these horrible  _ murderers _ even as a way to temporarily save himself and Reira, but he had no other option.

“You know of me, you must know also of my work and my abilities. I can research what is happening and fix it. I can do it faster than any of your people can.”

Roget considered him for a long moment. Then he sighed.

“Kill the both of them.”

_ No _ ! Reiji’s last chance dissipated. He twisted and yanked and he though he felt something in his shoulder pop and then — 

He heard the horrible sound of a blade thunking through flesh, the soft  _ inhale _ of someone as all the air went out of them, and for just a moment, he shattered.

And then he noticed that the blade was  _ not _ in Reira.

A girl stood stock still, like a statue, her hands wrapped around the hilt of the blade, standing over Reira with the knife plunged into one of Reira’s captor’s chests. Reira coughed the cloth from their mouth, curling up into a ball and clapping their hands over their ears, crying.

The girl yanked the blade out of the man’s chest, catching him on the shoulders, and throwing him back before he collapsed on top of her and Reira. Her dark purple hair, almost black in the dim light, swung like a shadowy cape behind her as she turned.

Roget yelled, but Reiji didn’t hear what he was saying, as the group of black robed figures all began to swell and scatter about, trying to rush towards the girl. But he saw all of it in slow motion, his eyes fixed on the girl for reasons he could not quite place, as the girl continued to slowly, slowly turn to face towards them.

He couldn’t be sure if the scream came from him, from someone behind him, or if it was only inside his own head.

The girl stared out with eyes as black as holes in her head, and lifted the bloody blade towards the oncoming attackers. A terrible, thin smile twisted over her face as the blood trickled down it and onto her hand. She slashed it through the first throat that came near enough, blood splattering her front, so fast that Reiji hadn’t even see her move.

A deep, rumbling sigh seemed to escape from somewhere inside her, rumbling out almost through her skin rather than her throat.

It was the sort of sigh of someone who was very, very content with themselves.


	13. Chapter 13

Selena hummed tunelessly as she wandered down the hallway, the frame tucked under her arm. The hallway’s lights had all gone out, but that was all right. She could see fine in the dark. 

Somewhere far away, she heard a smashing and shaking sound. The Repository, most likely. It was getting agitated...just like  _ She  _ had said it would, with the power growing so strong now, with the moon so close.

The vessels had gotten away from Selena. But that was all right, too. They’d simply cause more confusion, give her more time to prepare — without Roget noticing. She could find them later. Direct them to their place.

She propped the frame in her arms up as she stopped. This was a good place to put this one. She retrieved the hammer from her belt, and a nail, sticking it between her teeth while she found the right spot to put it. 

The motel shook from a distant commotion while she hammered the nail into place. She put her hammer back on her belt. She shifted the frame that leaned against her, and pushed it against the wall, lifting it up so that the string on the back could catch on the nail. 

Selena looked at her own face in the mirror’s surface as she wriggled the mirror into place, straightening it, then stepping back to examine it. Her eyes flickered down to her own reflection, and she stared into her dim green irises. Just her. Just her, right now.  _ She _ must be elsewhere now. The thought made Selena feel, briefly, jealous. Shouldn’t she be enough? Hadn’t she been enough all these years?

She stilled those thoughts. Those thoughts would not serve  _ Her _ or  _ Her _ plan. Selena only had to do her duties to the best of her abilities. That was all that was required of her — she couldn’t fail at such a simple task.

She turned away from the her reflection, and walked back to the end of the hall to the closet. She pulled two more mirrors from inside and tucked them under her arms.

In no hurry, she began to walk down another hallway. The floor shook beneath her feet, but she did not hesitate.

There was plenty of work to do. And there was plenty of time to do it all.

She continued to hum her tuneless song, and dragged the mirrors down the hallway after her.

* * *

Rin squinted at yet another page of unintelligible symbols, and tossed them over her shoulder with a shake of her head. Yuya snatched it from the air and looked at it, then shook his head, too. Rin was pretty good at figuring out which of the ones were worth trying to decipher...and with Yuya’s growing headache, he definitely didn’t think this was one of them.

Yuto rubbed at his head with the heels of his palms, staring at what they had already gathered and spread over the floor.

“So?” Rin asked, flipping through a leatherbound notebook. “Anything coming together?”

Yuto groaned, closing his eyes and massaging his temples. Yuya winced, too, as the headache spiked. The chanting had becoming nothing more than a monotone ripping through his body at such a dull, steady level that it was both easy to ignore and impossible to forget. He pushed some of the papers around.

“Right now...ugh.” He rubbed at his aching head. “This...this seems to be the most important.”

He tapped at a careful sketch of a magic circle, with another sketch beside it from an angle as though viewing it drawn out on the ground, surrounded by carefully erected pillars.

“This looks like it’s the way they’re setting up their demon summoning ritual,” Yuya said. “I don’t really get...all of the pieces, but...”

He shook his head, trying to rid himself of the cottony feeling of pain that stuffed his head full.

“I think, maybe, if we can sabotage this...they’ll have to start over.”

“The moon phase and position seems really specific,” Yuto said, looking at another page. “This... _ Zarc _ . That seems to be the demon they’re trying to summon — well, he’s really picky, it seems. Everything has to be absolutely perfect.”

“So if we knock a few things out of place, they just  _ can’t _ do the ritual until, what...next year?” Rin said.

“Not until another  _ ten  _ years,” Yuto said. “That will be when the moon phase and position coincide again...if I’m doing this math they have here right. If this  _ math _ is right to begin with.”

He frowned, and then groaned. Yuya closed his eyes at a fresh wash of pain through his head, too.

“Are you sure you guys are okay?” Rin said, frowning with concern. 

“We’re going to have to be,” said Yuto, kneading his palms into his temples.

“We’ll make it,” said Yuya. He picked up another page, frowning. “Geez. This is a lot of  _ detail _ . Look at all of these tunnels that are supposed to be under the motel.”

He wiggled one of the pages at them. It was one of the first pages they’d found, a planned map of the tunnels.

“Can you imagine how much work they had to do to build all of these, in just the right designs?” Yuya said. “All for one ritual that if even one thing goes wrong, you have to start over and do it all again in ten year’s time.”

“They’re crazies,” Rin said. “Crazies will do anything to be crazy.”

“You’ve got that right,” Yuto said.

Yuya frowned at the map though. There had been a few copies of this map that they’d found, with notations and changes to the blueprints here and there. He wasn’t sure which one was the most recent one, but if they could find one that was the most accurate, they might be able to use them to find a way out of here...though, not that any of those tunnels seemed to have any entrances or exits, save for a single one — which he was guessing was through the other door in this study. What was the point of that?

Yuya squinted at the thin handwriting, trying to read it.

_ This curve is imperative _ , it read, pointing at one of the curves.  _ Please remember to refer to the provided texts — these tunnels must funnel His energy appropriately, or he may revive weakened _ .

Yuya’s lips parted with understanding, as it dawned on him. This was just another layer of their weird cult bullshit, thinking that building tunnels underneath their magic circle would make their demon more powerful, or something. But hang on...

He frowned, picking up one of the other maps, and compared them. The “imperative” curve was missing in this one. He scrabbled for the other two copies of the tunnel map they had found, laying them next to each other and frowning. He rearranged them several times, pulled them to his eyes and tried to squint at the handwriting — and that’s when he saw it.

Pencil marks. The mark of something that had been carefully erased, but still imprinted like a ghost into the paper. Yuya grabbed the first page and compared it.

The important curve had been  _ erased _ . Erased and replaced with a different design. He looked at all four again.

“Guys,” he said slowly. “Don’t quote me on this but...it looks a lot like someone’s  _ already _ been sabotaging this ritual.”

Rin looked up from the desk, and Yuto frowned.

“Look,” he said. “The design keeps getting slightly changed from one to another. Things that are labeled as being important are gone. And — ”

He grabbed the sketch of the magic circle, laying it next to the maps. The first one looked — it looked like the same design, almost, with just a few miniscule changes. Yuya rearranged the maps again, until he thought he could see the pattern. It was as though the map had been slowly, carefully changed in small ways, small enough that no one would immediately notice if they weren’t already laid next to each other...

“I don’t think that means much,” said Rin doubtfully. “I mean, they might have just learned more about what to do? And changed it over time?”

“That makes sense,” said Yuto.

The chanting was more of a low rumble, now, a constant breathing out in Yuya’s head that made his mind spin. 

“But why would it change to be further from this original design?” Yuya said, shaking the magic circle design. “That doesn’t seem to match, right? If everything is for this demon guy, shouldn’t things match?”

“Why should anything with these crazies make any sense?” Rin pointed out.

“These could be going in an opposite direction, too,” Yuto said. “Maybe this one that you say is the furthest away from the original design is actually their earliest attempt, and the design goes in the opposite direction.”

That...that could be true. But something was niggling at Yuya’s brain — something that he couldn’t quite place. He stared at the four maps again.

He frowned. He reached out, and pressed his finger against the last one, the one that he believed was the most recent map. The center of this design was farther to the left than the first one. If he had the whole orientation right, that would put the center of this design....right under the motel, instead of under the magic circle set up outside, under the moon. What was the significance of that? Was Yuto right? Was Yuya seeing patterns that weren’t there? Did it matter at all?

“Let’s just grab what we can and set fire to it, maybe,” Rin said. “Then we can go and push their pillars over.”

“Sounds like a good enough plan to me,” said Yuto. “Make it impossible for them to rebuild.”

Yuya rubbed his forehead, trying to block out the  _ whining _ in his head. It was like the voices he thought he heard were starting to  _ scream _ , one at a time, and then fall back into the constant humming.

He was so distracted by that sound, that he didn’t immediately hear the feet on the stairs, until he registered the sound of the door knob jiggling.

His heart rose in his throat. Rin flinched up — she’d heard it too. Yuto looked only confused, and tired — dark circle were forming under his eyes, and Yuya felt almost as hollow as Yuto looked.

The doorknob jiggled again and someone swore on the other side. The three of them looked at each other.

They couldn’t fight — not like this, Yuya thought. Not when Yuto and he were both so wiped out, forcing Rin to have to fight for all three of them. His eyes fell to the maps. Then to the door in the back of the room, the one he was sure led into the tunnels.

They couldn’t fight. But they could still  _ run _ .

* * *

Yuzu screamed as the monster began to charge down the hallway after Rin instead of after her. She flung another broken piece of wall at its back, but it didn’t seem to notice this time. 

She watched helplessly as Rin fled, and the monster was at her heels.

Oh god, oh god, oh god — what  _ was _ that thing? Where had it come from? What would it do if it caught Rin?

_ This is my fault _ , she thought.  _ My fault — if we had stayed where we were — waited for rescue — we could have maybe handled what was in there but this thing?? _

She didn’t really think about it. She ran  _ after  _ the monster.

She yelled and screamed and waved her arms, anything to try and confuse it, to get it to feel stuck between two targets and give both her and Rin space to breathe and run while it thought about it — but it had focused on Rin, and it didn’t listen to her, didn’t notice when she scooped up pieces of broken wood to hurl at its back.

“Leave her alone!” she shrieked. “Leave her alone, leave her alone, leave her alone —”

And then she heard Rin shriek and then the shriek almost immediately disappear, and her heart stopped. Oh god oh god oh god —

The monster stopped, fumbling to a stop. It stumbled, falling forward onto its huge hands and long arms. It stopped dead for a moment — Yuzu didn’t see it holding anything in its hands. Rin wasn’t — it didn’t have Rin. What had happened to Rin?

The creature lowered its head to the floor. Yuzu froze, trembling, barely breathing — she couldn’t really see around the creature’s body. Was Rin on the floor? Had she passed out?

Then the monster slowly began to turn around in the hallway. It swung its head, its terrifying eyes, towards her.

It fixed its gaze on her.

Yuzu almost passed out. She had no idea what had happened to Rin — but whatever it had been, she’d gotten her wish. The creature was focused on her now.

Then the fear took over. She ran.

The entire hallway shook, nearly toppling her while the monster charged after her.

Yuzu slammed into a door and fumbled desperately to bounce off it, careening back down the hallway. The loose strands of her sagging pigtail weighed against the side of her head, bangs matted to her forehead, and she could not  _ breathe _ . The monster was coming, it was coming, and it was going to kill her, and she was going to  _ die _ . Oh  _ god _ . She was going to  _ die _ .

The hall shook around her as she bounced off another door when she tried to careen about the corner. Her heart rose in her throat, choking away what air she had left. She couldn’t keep running. But if she stopped — if she stopped, it was over. If she stopped, she gave up.

Even in her fear, she wasn’t ready to give in to the end.  _ Not yet _ . Not yet!! She wasn’t ready to say it was over!!

She stumbled as her one foot without a shoe caught unevenly in the wood, and she tumbled to the ground, knocking the wind out of herself for a moment. The air parted over her head as the monster’s hand swiped at the place she had been — oh god. If she hadn’t tripped —

The creature’s hand slammed into the wall next to them as it overshot where it had thought she would be. She screamed — drywall and dust crumbled down over her head as the hand punched through it. She heard the wall groaning as the creature tried to pull its hand free of the wall it had embedded itself into.

Working on nothing but a blind fear, a blind instinct to  _ run run run _ , she scrambled up to her hands and knees. Her ankle shrieked with pain when she tried to put weight on it and she collapsed. Tears filled her eyes, blurring her vision. Oh god. She couldn’t run. She couldn’t...

“There she is!” 

“Dammit, you little bitch...”

Yuzu choked on her air, lifting her head — at the other end of the hall, two tall figures in black cloaks emerged, running towards her. One of them raised their hands and yelled something in a language Yuzu didn’t know, and the creature behind her stilled.

She felt her lungs freeze over. Those people — they controlled this monster. They...they were going to take her again, after all of this.

“Don’t move, girl!” one of them shouted, still making their way towards her. “Or I’ll have the Repository crush you to pieces!”

Yuzu’s breaths came in thin, whistling tones that made her head feel like it was floating off of her body.

It was then her eyes saw the door. The only door in this entire goddamned motel so far that was cracked open. And it was close — it was so close. She could reach it before those men reached her.

If Yuzu had been thinking straight, she would have realized that getting through that door meant nothing. This monster was able to break through  _ walls _ with its body. She had no idea what was on the other side of that door, either. But its hand was still temporarily stuck, staring at itself as though in confusion, and Yuzu had to take what little hope she could get or she might simply die on the spot.

She crawled. She pulled herself by her hands and knees as fast as she could go, ignoring the aches and pains that consumed her body, that spasmed up her leg every time she moved her ankle. The door was feet away. Inches. One of the cultists shouted, and they were quickly gaining ground on her.

Behind her, the wall crumbled as the monster finally ripped its hand out of it, and the ceiling groaned. From behind, it lurched for her — from in front of her, the cultists drew every nearer.

But she didn’t stop moving — she reached for the door, she batted it open, and she yanked herself inside.

It was a motel room like all the others, rundown, worn, empty of furniture, with holes in the floor — nothing to defend herself. Nowhere to hide.

She heard the floor creak and shake in the wake of the monster, still coming towards her, the cultists shouting, and she nearly broke. A second door yawned open to her left, an abyss of darkness and porcelain floors — a bathroom. 

It was so stupid, but her brain wasn’t functioning. She crawled into the tiny motel bathroom and slammed the door behind her, turning the lock — instantly, she was plunged into darkness.

The door shook behind her as someone slammed into it, and she screamed.

“Open this door right now, you little bitch!” the man on the other side shouted. “Would you rather the Repository drag you out?”

Yuzu couldn’t  _ breathe _ . She shook like a leaf, her hand pressed over her mouth as tears rolled down her cheeks. In the dark, she could see only a smoky image of herself in the mirror across from the door, the glitter of her tears from her wide, terror-filled eyes. She didn’t know — she didn’t know what to do. There was nothing she could do. The door shook again against her back, and she pressed hard against it, willing the wood to hold — but once that monster shredded the wood to pieces, there would be nothing to protect her.

_ I can’t do anything _ , she thought, dim and distant from her body.  _ There’s nothing I can do. I...I failed everyone. Rin, and Ruri. Their friends. If I hadn’t encouraged them to escape...why did I think I was strong enough? _

“Do you want to be?”

Yuzu didn’t hear the voice so much as she felt it, like a cold wind dropping the temperature in the room by a good ten degrees and causing her hair to stand on end. 

It seemed, for a moment, like the whole world got quiet. No more shouting from the people on the other side of the door. No more shaking of the wood against her back. There was nothing, except the ringing in her ears, a monotone that seemed to be steadily getting louder.

Her reflection...wasn’t looking at her.

Yuzu stared as though through a long tunnel at the visage in the mirror. It...It  _ was _ her. But it was...from behind. She was looking at herself from behind. Her own self, with her pigtails falling out of their ties, standing with her back to herself.

Something in Yuzu’s chest screamed, but something else seemed to silence it.

“Do you want to be strong enough?”

Yuzu swallowed. She heard the shouting again, but it was distant. Far away. Tears bubbled to her eyes.

“I just want...” she gasped. “I just want — I don’t want to be here! I want to go home, with everyone...”

Her reflection did not move. It was impossibly still. The whole world was. The temperature continued to drop, and she could see her breath.

Then her reflection turned. Fear exploded within her, and yet, she could not move.

The face that looked back at her was hers, and yet — it was not. Swirling black holes replaced her eyes, as the figure leaned forward to the glass, pressing up against it.

“I know,” it said, though its mouth did not move. “But the only way to go home...is to destroy them all.”

Yuzu had stopped breathing — her heart had stopped beating. 

The mirror  _ expanded _ , like a clear membrane, as her reflection pushed against the film, slowly pushing both hands outwards. Its face did not change — those huge black eyes were dragging her inside them.

“Don’t worry,” her reflection soothed, and then it was no longer her own voice — it was someone  _ else’s _ . Someone older than she was. Someone much, much  _ colder _ . “I’ll protect you. You’ll be all right. Just close your eyes.”

The membrane of the mirror snapped, and her reflection  _ stretched  _ free — the bathroom seemed to expand infinitely into an ever expanding corridor and her reflection lengthened from its end, coming mere inches from her face — 

For just one moment, her reflection wasn’t hers. For just a breath, she saw her reflection’s hair grow longer, darker; saw a ghastly gash open up in her throat and spill blood all down her front.

Then her reflection’s mouth opened wide like a black hole, and her black-hole eyes expanded, and it dissolved into a thick black smoke that flooded into Yuzu’s mouth and eyes and ears and sucked away any scream she might have had left within her.

And then Hiragi Yuzu was no longer there.


	14. Chapter 14

The knife slipped from the girl’s hand and clattered to the floor. Reiji chanced looking up. As soon as the girl had gone on her rampage, his captors had released him, and he’d crawled over to Reira, hunching over them while the cloaked figures yelled and screamed and found themselves entirely useless against the girl, who had moved like a blur, too fast to see before her knife was in another throat.

Some had managed to flee — Reiji thought perhaps Roget was one of them. 

But now the bloody knife was on the floor, and he dared to look up, wondering if somehow, they’d avoided becoming targets.

He looked up just in time to see something gust out of the girl, out of her eyes and nose and mouth, like a black smoke that poured out of her and dissipated immediately. Her eyes faded back to a normal shade, of deep magenta and pools of white. She swayed, staring out at nothing, her face suddenly slack with uncertainty.

Reiji stood just in time for the girl to stumble forward, and fall. He caught her almost without thinking about it and she slumped against him, her face falling into his shoulder. His heart screamed in his chest — just a moment ago she’d...she’d been the reason for the bodies now scattered all about them. He should...he should be running, shouldn’t he?

“W....where...?” the girl said, the words fumbling out of her. “What...?”

“Breathe,” he told her. “Take deep breaths.”

He helped lower her to her knees on the floor, and she slowly sat back — he still held her shoulders, and from here, he could now see the blood that had splattered all across her jacket and skirt and tights. Her hair had come mostly undone from her bun, her wing hair clip sagging in its place. 

She looked groggy, as though she’d just woken up from a long sleep. She squinted at him like someone whose vision hadn’t yet cleared. Those yawning black holes for eyes...they were gone, and she seemed an ordinary person again.

“Who...where am I?” she mumbled.

“Take deep breaths,” Reiji said. “My name is Akaba Reiji. Do you know yours?”

“K...Kurosaki...Ruri...”

Reiji sucked in a sharp breath, his hands tightening on her shoulders in spite of himself. Kurosaki.

This was Kurosaki’s missing younger sister.

_ She’s alive, _ he thought.  _ That’s one point in our favor. _

His skin crawled, however, as his eyes flickered towards the lumps of black fabric, shrouding the bleeding bodies like funeral shrouds all around them.

_ Perhaps we have another problem on our hands. _

“That’s good,” he said, keeping his voice calm. “I know your brother. Kurosaki Shun. He’s somewhere here, come to rescue you.”

This seemed to stir something in Ruri, and her eyes widened, lips parting as she began to come awake. She reached for Reiji’s arms, gripping at them.

“My brother?” she said, her voice cracking hoarsely. “My brother is here? Oh, god — that stupid, reckless —”

Her eyes flickered down, and he saw them widen, and he knew she had caught sight of a body. He moved his hands up to her face, holding her gaze on him.

“Don’t look,” he said. “Not yet. Kurosaki Ruri-san — what is the last thing you remember?”

Ruri’s breaths hitched and heaved, but she did not try to pull away from him, and she didn’t try too hard to look at what she had seen.

“I...I was running,” she said. “I was running from those men who kidnapped me — we’d escaped, Yuzu-san, and Rin-chan, and I...”

Reiji stirred with some relief in spite of himself. Yuzu. She’d managed to escape as well. That was good — assuming she was still alive, and not under the effects of...whatever had happened to Kurosaki Ruri.

“But we got separated, and I tried to run to draw them off of Rin-chan and Yuzu-san,” Ruri said. “And I...”

Her eyes seemed to fade out for a moment as she thought about it.

“I...I found a bathroom, and ran in to hide, and...and the mirror...”

She trailed off. Reiji could see the distant look in her eyes, and doubted he would get any further answers from her. She was in shock, he thought. Even before she had seen the damage she had done, or the blood on her hands. He would need to do something to distract her.

“There’s...there’s dead people all around us,” Ruri said. “Who killed them?”

Dammit. He couldn’t stop her from pulling her face out of his hands, and looking down at her own, staring at the blood that coated her palms. She looked at the fallen knife, and then at the bodies.

The faintest of trembles rose to her fingers, and her cheeks grew pale. Briefly, she turned her eyes to him.

“I think I already know the answer,” she said. “But did you do this? Or did I?”

Reiji considered her a moment, trying to decide the emotion behind her words. Her voice was even, almost calm as she asked her question, though her face was pale, and her expression almost stony.

“You don’t remember anything at all, do you?” he said.

He leaned away from her, and stood up.

“One way or another, you saved mine and Reira’s lives,” he said. “I don’t know what happened to you, or why. I suspect we may have a chance to get to the bottom of it, however, if we make our way carefully.”

He glanced towards the door out of the motel, and remembered the monster there, shivering faintly.

“I would tell you to run, and take my younger sibling with you, but unfortunately, it seems it’s actually  _ safer _ in here for the time being.”

Ruri shivered, but otherwise didn’t respond. She had her hands knotted in her hair, now, staring at the knife on the floor as though it were a page written in another language. The blood in her hands was getting in her hair now.

Reiji knew she was going to need help — more than he could provide her, especially right now. The only thing they could do was try to keep going. He turned to check on Reira. They hadn’t moved from their spot since the cult had released them, still curled up in a ball with their hands over their ears. They’d stopped shaking, at least, and Reiji gently touched their shoulder.

“Reira?” he said. “How are you feeling?”

Reira stirred, tentatively moving their hands from their ears.

“It’s finally quiet,” they whispered.

Reiji wasn’t sure what that meant, but at least it meant Reira was feeling a little better. He helped Reira sit up, trying to shield their eyes from the view of the bodies on the ground. Reira, however, seemed to have no interest in looking at them. Instead, their eyes were fixed on Ruri all of a sudden.

Reiji swore softly. All of the blood — seeing her must frighten them.

But Reira didn’t tremble, or tear up, or even freeze the way they did when they were scared. They clung to Reiji’s hand, but continued to look at Ruri.

“Do you have any idea what is going on in here?” Ruri asked hollowly, without looking. “Why did...why did they take us here?”

She stared at the lumps on the ground, almost distant. Reiji tightened his lips. His eyes flickered to Reira — he didn’t want to talk about such things in front of them.

“I believe...they’re a cult of some sort,” Reiji said carefully. “They may want to use you in...a ritual of some variety.”

Ruri looked at her bloody hands again.

“Is...is that what happened?” she said, her voice cracking. “Is that what happened to me? Is that why I don’t remember anything?”

Reiji bit his lip. He had no idea how to answer. From what he understood...if anything, she would have been one of the sacrifices, not the vessel so she shouldn’t have been... And...what was he even thinking? Did he really believe in demons?

_ Can I honestly say I do not? _ a treacherous voice in his head whispered, as he looked at the bloody bodies and remembered the unnatural way the girl had moved, the gaping holes instead of eyes, the terrible smile on her face. He clenched his jaw.

Reira tugged on his shirt, then, and he turned to them. He was surprised to see a very serious look on his younger sibling’s face — clear, for once looking right up at him in a way they rarely did, as though they were suddenly, finally, fully present in this moment.

“Niisama,” they whispered. “I...I can still hear her...she left, but I can still hear her...she was calling for us to come and see her.”

Reiji frowned, brow furrowing. He held Reira’s shoulder gently.

“Reira, I don’t understand,” he said in a calm voice. “Can you try to explain it to me?”

Reira thought for a moment, biting his lip as they tried to organize their thoughts.

“I...I came out here because she called for me to come, through the mirror,” they said. “She told me to go to the door and she was standing there, and she asked me to come, and I got into the car because she said you were going to be there too, and then she asked me to get out near the woods and wait.”

Reiji’s heart thrummed in his chest. What on earth was this? Someone had brought Reira here? On purpose? Who? Why?

“Who?” Reiji asked. “Who asked you to come here, Reira?”

Reira blinked up at him.

“Oneesama,” they said.

Reiji’s mind stopped, as surely as the time had stopped, for one, ringing moment. When he came back to himself, Reira shivered slightly. Ruri stared at the two of them, her brow furrowed and lips parted, as though waiting for an explanation. But what explanation could he give?? That his younger sibling was telling him that their dead sister had come to their home, driven them out to the woods, and left them there for Reiji to find?

_ Why did Selena leave the message for me to come and find out what was happening? _ Reiji thought suddenly.  _ Roget didn’t know why I was here. Why did Selena lure me here? _

_ My sister is dead _ , he reminded himself again, but a faint chill had spread through him that he couldn’t shake.

Reira gripped at Reiji’s arms.

“She’s hurting, niisama,” Reira said, voice cracking. “I only came because — because she’s hurting so much. She doesn’t sound like oneesama anymore.”

Ruri looked like she was going to say something, leaning forward with her lips parted. Then her eyes caught on something behind them, widening. She sucked in a breath and tears flooded to her eyes.

“N-Niisan,” she gasped. “Niisan!!”

She leaped to her feet and started to surge forward — then she froze, looking down at her bloody hands again. For the first time, it seemed to sink in, the horror of her current state. She drew back, as Reiji turned around to indeed see Kurosaki Shun stumbling through the door to the motel hallways. 

His eyes snapped up at Ruri’s voice, and his eyes widened. He, too, tried to stagger forward, but as soon as he let go of the door, his whole body keeled forward. Reiji swore mentally. He leaped up and hurried over to him.

“What happened?” Reiji asked. “Are you —”

He swore as he found something warm against his hand, lifting it away and finding blood.

“It’s — I’m fine,” Kurosaki gasped. “Just — grazed me.”

“Oh my god,” Ruri gasped, her voice breaking, and she forgot her bloody hands, racing forward to throw herself against him. “What did you — why did you come?! Oh my god, are you bleeding? What happened?”

Reiji managed to push Kurosaki to a sitting position, pushing his hands and Ruri’s away from the wound. Kurosaki was right, it was only a graze — but a deep enough one that it was bleeding profusely. Reiji grit his teeth, and unwound his scarf from his neck.

“Stay still,” he said. “Ruri-san, please help me hold his shirt up away from the wound.”

Ruri tried to touch the shirt as little as possible, biting her lip at her messy hands. If Kurosaki noticed her state, he didn’t say anything about it — the pain seemed to be distracting him right now, though he kept a hand against Ruri’s side as though to confirm she was still there.

Reiji wrapped his scarf around Shun’s torso as tightly as he could manage, tying it off. It wouldn’t work forever, but it would have to do for now. Dammit.

“What happened?” Reiji asked. “When we were separated, how did...”

Kurosaki coughed, and Ruri tried to support him before he doubled over.

“Well,” Kurosaki said. “Your dad is here — and he fucking shot me.”

Reiji felt something inside him simply give out, as though all of his muscles, all at once, had decided to cease functioning, causing him to go limp as a ragdoll.

His father? He was here? He’d come here? And he was  _ shooting _ people?

He felt Reira’s eyes on him from behind, and started to breathe a little more tightly.

_ If this is a family reunion _ , he thought vaguely.  _ It seems to be the worst one I’ve ever attended. _

* * *

She walked. 

It was strange to feel the air against her skin again. She’d forgotten that it  _ felt _ like something, to move your arms against even still air. She’d forgotten what being cold felt like. She did remember that she hadn’t liked the cold very much back then, when the body had been one she could call Her Own and not the borrowed goods of someone else. 

Now however, she reveled in it — in the feeling of her hair rising on its ends, on her breath misting the space before her. This cold was hers, and it came with her.

She remembered, slowly, what it felt like to move her fingers. She had been using fingers a moment ago, but not  _ these _ fingers, and these fingers were different. A little less delicate, more used to pulling and carrying things. She opened and closed them, testing their movement, then swung her arms back and forth. Good. Very good. This body was already fairly strong, and with her added strength, she would have more than enough to do the things she needed to do.

She sort of missed the feeling of the blood on her hands, though. There was something cathartic about it — the feeling of blood that wasn’t her own, for once.

She paused as she passed a mirror hung on the wall between two of the doors. She leaned forward to examine herself. Ah. Her pigtails were coming undone. She reached up and took out one hair tie, combing through the hair with her fingers and then retying it into place. As she finished with the second one, she heard a soft  _ thump, thump, thump _ coming from the next hallway. She checked herself one more time — her face was dirty and dusty, and she was still missing a shoe. But that would have to suffice.

She turned away from her own gaping holes for eyes and continued down the hall. More mirrors appeared as she walked, until it seemed there was one every other door. She turned the corner.

Selena stood just halfway down the hall, a mirror leaned against the wall as she hammered another nail into the wall. She looked up, however, when She appeared around the corner.

Selena’s eyes widened, and she immediately dropped her head low.

“You’re here,” she said, her voice low and husky.

She smiled.

“Yes. I am.”

She frowned as the voice came out a little too deep for her vocal cords. Those were the most difficult, she was finding, to control. She walked forward, towards the still, waiting Selena.

Selena’s eyes darted up to Her as she approached. It was the first time She’d seen the girl’s true eye color. They were a deep, jewel-like green. They were pretty. She cupped Selena’s face in both hands, softly. Selena bit her lip.

“What’s wrong?”

Selena swallowed.

“...is...” she started. She tried again. “Is...is Yuzu all right in there?”

She dropped Her hands from Selena’s face, and tilted Her head.

“Has it ever hurt you, for me to be in your head?”

“No, of course not!” Selena said. “But...Yuzu isn’t used to it. And when you’re with me, you take only parts of me. Not all of me at once.”

She looked down at Her hands, turned them back and forth to stare at Her knuckles. Not Hers at all, as Selena pointed out. They belonged to the girl, Hiragi Yuzu. She smiled, as She took Selena’s cheek again.

“Don’t worry,” She said. “I’m not a monster — not like  _ him _ .”

The word came out of Her with far more venom than She intended, nearly twisting the body’s vocal cords. She tamped it down. If She pushed too hard, the girl would begin to disintegrate from the inside.

“I want to protect you,” She said, pressing her forehead to Selena’s. “I want to protect all of you. I won’t let any of you go to their altar.”

Selena’s breaths were short and thin.

“I want to help,” she said. “I really — I want to help you, please. Please let me do more. I can help you tear them all down, I can.”

“Of course,” She said, caressing Selena’s face. “You’ve done so much for me, Selena. You’ve worked so hard. Thank you so much. Tonight, it’s all over. All right?”

Selena closed her eyes, breathing out with something that might have been relief. But She wasn’t paying attention. Her mind was turning. Tumbling over itself. She inhaled sharply, enjoying the feeling of air in her lungs — it was the last night she would ever feel such a thing. Tonight...

Tonight, Akaba Ray would have her final revenge.


	15. Chapter 15

Yugo staggered one step forward at a time. Geez, for a guy who was his height and skinny as a rod, Yuuri sure was  _ heavy _ .

He wasn’t helping matters much, either, his body limp like a fish and not helping Yugo to support him at all. His glasses sat at the very edge of his nose, nearly sliding off, but he didn’t even try to fix them. He seemed like he might be in shock — well, he  _ had _ been shot in the chest. Oh, shoot, shoot, shoot, don’t think about that part, don’t think about the warm spot pressed against his back, if Yugo thought about that he might just start freaking out.

They had to get away from the crazy guy with the gun first, then he could take stock of the damage. For now, Yuuri was still breathing, even if it was shaky and fast, and that meant he wasn’t dead yet. Yugo heaved him a little more against his back. Honestly, the scariest part of it was that Yuuri wasn’t saying any mean things to him or calling him names. He seemed to have no end to his snarky quips during the time they’d been locked up together, especially once Yugo’s escape attempt had gotten the two of them tied up to each other’s backs. If Yuuri didn’t even have a rude thing to say to him, a quip about how Yugo carried him like a sack of potatoes or something, he must be  _ really _ hurt.

He gasped — okay, his arms were really starting to ache. They had to be far enough away from gun guy to rest a moment, right?

Yugo grunted as he leaned against the wall, using it to support himself as he carefully slid Yuuri back down to the floor.

He was still breathing, but it seemed a lot slower than before. Shoot, shoot, shoot. Yugo didn’t want to look at the blood because he was sure he was going to freak out, but — if he didn’t, Yuuri might actually  _ die _ , and that was even scarier. Yuuri was mean, but that didn’t mean he deserved to  _ die _ .

“Hey, okay I’m — I’m gonna move your shirt to see what it looks like,” Yugo said, bile rising up in his throat at the thought of the hole he was sure he was going to see. “Um. If that’s okay.”

“Shut  _ up _ ,” Yuuri responded, his breaths thin and voice even thinner. “If I am going to die, I don’t want the last thing I hear to be your voice.”

Well, he was well enough to be rude after all. That made Yugo actually feel a little better, so he ignored the jab and carefully tried to peel Yuuri’s shirt back from the wound. His shirt was all sticky from the blood and it was hard to move it, and Yuuri swore under his hissing breaths with pain when Yugo fumbled a little too clumsily. He managed to rip the hole in the shirt big enough for him to see what he was looking at, and he tried really hard not to throw up.

He’d definitely been shot, and maybe in a really bad place, not that Yugo knew much about first aid. It was a small, bloody hole that looked a lot bigger from all the blood, right in the place between Yuuri’s shoulder and his collarbone. It didn’t seem like it was low enough to have hit a lung, at least. 

Yugo swallowed thickly — okay, now what? He wasn’t a doctor! He didn’t even know if the bullet was still inside him, or how to get it out if it was, or how to close up the wound or at least stop it from bleeding. He should probably like — cover it with something? What, though? He didn’t have any bandages, and he didn’t think shirts tore as easily as it looked in the movies. 

He had  _ one _ thing, though, and he wasn’t sure....

“Hey,” Yugo said. “Hey, Yuuri, look at me!! Keep your eyes open!”

Yuuri’s lips curled, but he barely moved otherwise. He twitched his fingers, and fluttered his eyes to glare at Yugo with a half-hearted exhaustion.

“What?” he said.

Yugo swallowed.

“Okay, listen,” he said. “I don’t know how to help! And even though you’re really  _ mean _ , I don’t want you to die here, okay?? So this is all I’ve got right now.”

He held up the syringe and vial. Yuuri’s eyes slightly widened, and his lips parted. 

It was the same strange stuff that that guy had used on Kurosaki, and it had seemed to perk him up. Yugo doubted it could heal a whole bullet wound, but...it couldn’t make things  _ worse _ right??

“I don’t know what this is, and I probably could have grabbed one that isn’t actually medicine even though they look the same,” Yugo said quickly. “And I don’t even know if it will help if it I did grab the right one!! If you’re awake enough to yell at me, you’re awake enough to tell me if you want me to try this or not — I don’t want to put it into your body without knowing what it is!”

Yuuri stared at the vial for a long moment, and then his eyes shifted up to Yugo. There was a strange, considering look in Yuuri’s eyes. He coughed, and Yugo was almost afraid he would see blood come up with it, but he didn’t. Yuuri curled his fingers in and out.

Then he let out a hoarse, breathy laugh.

“I’m almost impressed,” he said. “That you had enough foresight to try taking something.”

He winced when he moved ever so slightly, closing his eyes.

“Just do it,” he said through grit teeth. “You can’t possibly make the situation any  _ worse _ ...surprising as it is.”

“Hey, I’m trying to save your life here!!” Yugo said, losing his composure finally. “You might be dying, but maybe you could be nice to me for just one second?? I’m scared too, you know!!”

Yuuri’s eyes widened.

“I,” he said, lips curling, “am not  _ scared. _ ”

“Oh really?” Yugo shot at him. “Even though you just got shot?? Even though there’s supposed to be a big monster in here, and a bunch of cultists who want to put demons in our heads?”

“Those aren’t real,” Yuuri said through grit teeth.

“So what??” Yugo said, throwing his hands into the air. “Maybe they are and maybe they’re not!! It’s still  _ scary _ . We’re still in a straight up horror video game and any normal human person would be  _ scared!! _ You are  _ bleeding _ to maybe death!! Let yourself be a normal human being for two seconds!!”

Yuuri stared at him, his eyes huge and mouth hanging half open. Yugo wasn’t sure, but he thought he might see tears in Yuuri’s eyes.

“Even if I were — scared,” Yuuri said, “I wouldn’t ever let anyone — see it.”

“Why not??” Yugo said. “We’re in the same boat, Yuuri!! Both of us are trapped here, both of us are in way over our heads, separated from most of the people who want to  _ not  _ kill us, surrounded by people who  _ do _ want to kill us or whatever, and you don’t want me to help? Why?? Because you don’t like me?? Well maybe you should grow up!! We’re in this together whether you like it or not — and if you still want to make fun of me when we get out of here, fine!! But wait until we  _ survive _ !”

Yuuri trembled, ever so slightly, eyes fixed on Yugo. Then he shifted his eyes away, tightening his hands into fists.

“Use the damn medicine,” he said through grit teeth.

“I  _ will _ !” Yugo said.

His fingers were shaking — whether from his anger or his fear or his exhaustion, he wasn’t sure, but he managed to hold steady enough to draw the liquid from the vial and into the syringe. He reached for Yuuri’s arm and pushed the sleeve back, and then hesitated — how did he...

“See my vein, right there in the crook of my elbow?” Yuuri said. “Poke the needle right there.”

“A-are you sure?”

“I was a nursing student for one semester, I learned this much,” Yuuri said.

Yugo briefly gaped at him.

“ _ You _ ? A  _ nurse _ ?”

“Shut up and inject me with the mystery medicine that very well might kill me, so that I don’t have to hear your inane comments anymore.”

Yugo rolled his eyes, trying to erase the sudden image in his head of Yuuri in one of those crappy Halloween sexy nurse costumes and gagging. His hand shook as he pushed the syringe towards Yuuri’s arm, and somehow, by some miracle, he managed to poke it right into the place that Yuuri had indicated. He pressed it down, and the liquid drained from the syringe and into Yuuri’s arm.

“Well?” Yugo said anxiously, as he pulled the syringe out and tossed it aside.

“It won’t work automatically,” Yuuri said, rolling his eyes.

“It seemed to work on Kurosaki really fast.”

“Placebo effect, maybe — and Kurosaki hadn’t been  _ shot _ .”

Yugo wanted to snark something back at him for that, but his brain really wasn’t in total working order and he wasn’t fast at that kind of thing anyway. He  _ thought _ that Yuuri’s breaths might be getting a little more steady and stronger, but maybe that was just wishful thinking.

He looked nervously up and down the hallway then. It was just occuring to him that his voice had probably been pretty loud — Rin had always told him he only seemed to have one volume setting — and he hadn’t even checked around to see if there was anything or anyone around. What if they got caught by the cultists? Yugo wasn’t sure if he could run very fast or far with Yuuri on his back.

As he looked, then, something came around the corner. Yugo tensed up — and then he saw her face, and the way she walked, and something in him lit up. There was only one person that could be!! Joy exploded in his chest and he leaped to his feet, beginning to run forward.

“Rin!!!” he shouted.

Before he could get far, however, a hand grabbed his ankle, nearly toppling him face first forward.

“Look closer, idiot!!” Yuuri hissed, heaving for breath from the exertion of holding onto Yugo.

Yugo was shocked to hear a tremor of unfiltered fear in Yuuri’s voice, and he stumbled to a stop, wheeling his arms. He looked up at the girl standing at the other end of the hall again, and took a second glance.

His skin crawled, and his hair rose on end. His throat closed.

The girl definitely  _ looked _ like Rin, though she had longer hair in pigtails instead of Rin’s bob. More importantly though...she had no  _ eyes _ . There were two gaping, swirling holes of blackness where her eyes should be, and when Yugo looked at them, he felt like he was going to throw up. His entire body began to shake as though he were having an allergic reaction.

A second girl rounded the corner after the first, holding hands with the first girl — she, too, looked a lot like Rin, though her hair was tied back in a ponytail. Her eyes, too, were black holes.

The girls looked at Yugo at the same time, their hands clasped together. For a moment, they only stared.

Then, in unison, they smiled.

“Hello, boys,” they said at the same time, two voices with a third, more rattling voice layered over the top.

Every sense in Yugo’s body  _ exploded.  _ He felt as though he were a rabbit staring at a drooling wolf hovering over him, an instinct he didn’t know he had screaming through him like a white hot fire. He stumbled backwards, almost tripping over Yuuri. Everything in his body screamed at him to  _ run run run _ , that there was a predator in front of him in way he had never felt before. Judging by Yuuri’s short breaths and wide eyes, he seemed to be feeling the same thing.

Despite the two of them holding hands, they both moved  _ incredibly  _ fast — neither of them hindered, as though they were a single entity melded together. Yugo squeaked with fear and then the two girls were both on top of him, shoving him to the floor.

Their free hands both wrapped around his throat, flinging him to the ground over the top of Yuuri’s legs. Yugo kicked and struggled — he didn’t want to hurt them, not really, but — he didn’t even know what was going on!

They were so strong, too!! He pried at their fingers, but it was like prying at iron! Both heads loomed over him, black eyes gaping as though to swallow him up. He couldn’t even — he couldn’t even fathom how much fear flowed through him right now.

“I have waited so damn long to get my fingers around your neck,” they hissed. “How does it feel, huh? To be the powerless one this time?”

Yugo kicked some more, but the fight was starting to go out of him.

“W....why?” he gasped out.

The girls tilted their head at the same time, staring at him. Then they laughed, a soft, breathy sound.

“Don’t act  _ dumb _ ,” they hissed. “I know what you are,  _ Zarc _ . You can’t hide in a human face forever. You can’t  _ run _ from me forever.”

“I — I don’t —”

And then suddenly, Yuuri was on the ponytail girl’s back. 

Both girls flinched as though they had both been struck. Yuuri clawed and scrabbled at her back, actually hissing as he fumbled to attack.

Both girls released Yugo, surging backwards to fling Yuuri back.

“Can’t you just be patient and wait for me to kill you?” they said with a hiss. “ _ I’ve  _ been  _ so _ patient. You weren’t  _ there _ when I got there. You wouldn’t  _ face me _ . I’ve waited  _ six years —” _

Yuuri didn’t respond, except by kicking out with both legs, and striking the girls right in their held hands.

It seemed more surprise than anything that caused them to let go of each other. The ponytail girl staggered to the side, as a black smoke seemed to burst out of her like a small bomb, and flow into the girl with the pigtails, who also stumbled back. Yugo gasped for air, trembling, but feeling as though the spell of fear had broken. He surged up to his feet. 

Yuuri still laid gasping on the floor, his body shuddering — one of the girls still looked stunned by her fall, and the other was only just starting to pick herself up.

Considering how fast they had been, he was pretty sure he had no way of getting away, by himself, or otherwise. But thinking too hard about things had never been Yugo’s strong suit.

Never giving up  _ was _ his strong suit.

He lurched forward, grabbing Yuuri and bodily throwing him over his shoulders. Then without another thought, he  _ ran _ .

“What are you — doing!! You idiot!” Yuuri gasped, flopping against Yugo’s back. “You’ll never get away from them with me —”

“Shut up!” Yugo yelled, careening around the corner. “Shut up shut up shut up for one second just shut up!!”

And in the most miraculous event of the night thus far, Yuuri did.

* * *

The pounding between Yuya’s ear was so  _ loud _ that it seemed to rattle his teeth, now. He groaned, squeezing his eyes shut briefly. 

“Which way now??” Rin yelled, and he peeled his eyes open.

The tunnels weren’t very big. He’d imagined from the door that they might be at least the size of a normal motel hallway up above, but they definitely weren’t. Just big enough for each of them to run one at a time, and slightly hunched, too, to avoid hitting their heads. The walls were little more than packed dirt, and Yuya worried that one false move might tumble the whole thing down on their heads — it seemed solid enough, however, when they bumped into them.

Rin felt around blindly, and Yuya could hear her slapping against the dirt. Yuya paused, breathing hard. It was  _ pitch _ black down here. There were no lights at all; and Yuya wasn’t sure if these tunnels had ever really been meant for people to be inside them, or if they had just built for the ritual purposes. At the very least, Yuya didn’t hear anyone following them...but he also didn’t hear much of all past the sound in his head.

He stumbled to a stop behind her, and Yuto bumped into him from behind, gasping for breath and shuddering. Yuya fumbled for the maps that he’d take with him, and Rin turned around towards the sound of the paper. She turned on the old flashlight they’d found before running, just bright enough to barely make out the lines on the page. Yuya winced through the pain of his headache.

“We went down a long tunnel from the door here,” he said, pointing at the first map. “That’s the same on all of them...”

He still hadn’t yet given up on his theory that the one furthest away from the magic circle symbol was the right one.

“Then we took two rights,” Rin said. “I think there’s two ways to go here, now.”

She swung the flashlight down both tunnels.

“Where...where do we want to try to go?” Yuto asked. “What are we even trying to do?”

“Lose the guys following us, at least,” Rin said. She pointed the flashlight back the way they’d came, but didn’t seem to see anything — not that the beam went far.

Yuya winced again, and he heard Yuto groan. He was sure the sounds were getting louder, but Rin still seemed unaffected.

“If....if this last map is right,” Yuya said finally, “and I think it is, because these ones...we shouldn’t have hit so many rights from the first hallway, unless I don’t have any idea where we are.”

He gasped at a fresh spike of head pain and pushed through it.

“If we go left at the next two passages, and then a right and then a left,” he said, pointing at the last map, “we’ll go straight through the center. Then we just swap those directions and we’ll loop back around to the door we came in. If those guys are following us, they should get lost on the way there, and we can just book it up the stairs.”

“Unless they’re waiting for us,” Rin grumbled.

That was definitely a possibility, and Yuya grimaced. They were running out of options, though, and he was running out of brain power. He rolled the maps back up.

“Let’s just try it,” Yuto said. “Go with your gut, Yuya. Ugh.”

Yuto rubbed at his forehead. The sound was just so  _ constant _ . There was no break to it.

“Okay, whatever you say,” Rin said. “Just remind me those directions!’

They headed off again, a little more slowly this time. Yuya knew he was right as soon as they took the first turn, because the sound in his head  _ swelled _ . He almost fell over, stumbling into Rin’s back, and Yuto almost fell onto him. It wasn’t just chanting anymore — it was a  _ chattering _ , like a thousand evil squirrels laughing underneath the sound of the people speaking in unison. It raised the hair on the back of Yuya’s nice and made him feel as though he were surrounded by...well, surrounded by demons.

Rin took the next turn that Yuya indicated, and now the air felt thick, like they were walking through a mist almost as thick as water. Even Rin seemed to feel it now, slowing down significantly, and coughing a bit with some of her breaths. It felt like it stuck to the insides of Yuya’s lungs like honey — in fact, his mouth tasted strangely sweet, a taste that made his head feel light and fuzzy. He had the vague sense that he was being  _ lured _ to something, and yet, there was no way to turn back.

Another turn, deeper into the dark, and the shadows seemed to come alive. Yuya wasn’t sure if he was simply hallucinating, but he thought he saw things crawling along the walls — long, spindly things, and short, bulbous things, things that he couldn’t quite wrap his mind around, that disappeared when he looked straight at them. The floor felt suddenly very squishy beneath his feet, and yet he did not look down, as though something in him were afraid to see what was beneath him.

They took the last turn, the one that Yuya had said would lead them right through the middle — and he realized that he had been right.

This tunnel was bigger than the others. It was wide, and tall enough to stand up straight, and open. Five more tunnels led out of it from different directions, gaping holes of darkness that writhed with the strange not-creatures that Yuya still wasn’t sure if they were hallucinations or not.

More importantly, however, right in the center of the room, there was a crack in the floor. And something like a purple smoke was seeping out of it.

The sound was coming from there, Yuya realized, his mouth dry. All of the sounds were, and the sensations, they were  _ pouring _ out of that crack in the floor. It was like a giant X, but uneven and jagged like a scar. A faint purple glow rose from within it, the smoke sparked with black embers that turned white and green as they flew out of the crack and then skittered briefly on the dirt packed earth.

Rin swore, but Yuya hardly heard her. He couldn’t hear  _ anything _ . He could only stare, open mouthed, his mouth filled with the taste of honey and his ears full of the buzzing sound of bees that now joined in with the chanting and laughter.

He felt, for a moment, like he wanted to walk  _ into _ the crack. That he wanted to walk forward and simply fall into it, and see where it would take him — never mind that it wasn’t big enough for a person to fall into, he felt somehow in his bones that it would be easy to step onto it, and disappear.

But then a hand wrapped around his arm, and he startled — a cool, refreshing feeling rushed through him, and like a light had been turned off, the sounds, the tastes, and the sights all vanished. His head rang with the silence and stillness — all that remained was the crack, and the smoke billowing steadily out of it, and yet somehow not filling up the room.

“What are you guys doing??” Rin hissed, and Yuya realized that he  _ had _ stepped forward. Yuto had, too. Rin clung to both of them, and Yuto looked as shell-shocked as Yuya felt. “Don’t get close to whatever that is!”

Now that Rin was holding onto him, Yuya could definitely see it wasn’t something he wanted to get near. Something...black, and goopy was bubbling from the crack, not quite enough to bubble up onto the floor, but definitely enough to look gross.

“What is it?” Yuto gasped.

Rin opened her mouth, though how she would have answered, Yuya had no idea. A voice rang out from beyond the smoke, cutting her off.

“It’s a door to hell.”

Rin swore, and Yuya flinched. What was it? A monster? A demon?

It was only a man who walked around the plume of smoke, but somehow, that seemed worse. He was much taller than any of them, broad and tanned, his hair shaved away and his eyes deep set. A shotgun laid nestled in his arms, pointed at them, with another slung around his back.

All three of them shrank back towards the tunnel, but the man raised his gun.

“Don’t move,” he said.

They froze. Rin’s fingers dug into Yuya’s arm, and he was afraid of what might happen if he let go. The man gestured at them with the barrel of his gun.

“Girl, step aside. Both of the others, walk over here with your hands on your heads.”

Yuya started to move his hands slowly, not willing to fight a guy with a gun on this.

But Rin tightened her grip on both of them, moving slightly forward, putting herself in the way.

“What if I don’t step aside?” she said.

The man blinked at her, expression unchanging. Yuya shot her a nervous look. What was she doing?

“Move,” the man said again, his gun pointed at them.

“No!” Rin said. “Why do you want me out of the way? Are you going to shoot them? Are you from the cult? I’m not taking any orders from you — you’ll have to shoot me!”

Something in the man’s eyes flinched. The gun tilted slightly down.

Rin moved forward again, pushing both Yuya and Yuto behind her so that they practically clunked together. She released them both in order to raise both her fists, and almost immediately, the sound of chanting in Yuya’s head began to slowly rise up inside him once again. More out of instinct than anything, he grabbed Rin’s shoulder, and Yuto did too at almost the same moment. The sounds and sights all faded once again. Yuya didn’t know why, but Rin seemed to be driving away the sensations. 

Rin jumped a little bit from them grabbing her, but she didn’t turn around to see why. She kept her eyes fixed on the man with the gun.

“I thought so!” she said, narrowing her eyes at him. “You’re just targeting them!! Why??”

“They’re dangerous,” the man said, his jaw tight. “They have a special blood running within them — a blood that attracts demons.”

_ What?? _ Yuya didn’t even know how to process the wildness of that statement.

“Are you with the cult?” Rin asked.

She took a small step backwards, and Yuya and Yuto moved with her. They needed to go forward, past that creepy crack if they wanted to get out — Yuya wasn’t sure he could find his way back if they backtracked. But to go that way meant almost getting shot...

He tugged gently on Rin’s shoulder, trying to urge her to take a step to the left. If they sidled along the wall, they could get to the tunnel that would lead them on the loop back to the exit. He wasn’t sure if Rin knew what he was doing, but she did move slightly in that direction.

The man’s face darkened at the accusation, and his hands tightened on his weapon.

“Absolutely not,” he said. “They  _ killed _ my daughter...and they’ll kill you, too, girl, if you give them the chance.”

Yuya sucked in a breath, suddenly understanding — his daughter...that meant...

“You’re — you’re Reiji’s dad,” he blurted.

The man’s lips parted, eyes shooting to Yuya. His eyes darkened, and Yuya’s skin crawled.

“How do you know my son?” he said, pointing his gun at them again.

“He’s my friend!!” Yuya squeaked. “We go to class together!!”

It sounded so stupid to say out loud, considering their situation. The idea of college and classes almost seemed more surreal than their surroundings, like a dream that he had never actually lived. He started to tremble.

Reiji’s father’s face darkened. He shook his head.

“He would not be your  _ friend _ if he knew what you were,” he said. “If he knew how your existence would cause another tragedy.”

“We don’t want anything to do with this!” Yuto shouted. “If you just let us go, we’d never participate in anything like this!”

“Your willingness does not matter,” said Akaba. “So long as those like you exist, these people will  _ never _ stop. Some rat will always survive, and continue the cycle of tragedy.”

“We could help you stop them!” Yuya said. “We don’t want to — we don’t want our friends to be sacrificed!”

Akaba’s lips tightened.

“You think it’s so easy?” he said. “Ray attempted to wipe them all out at once. She nearly managed it. But if even one survives, they’ll regroup, convert more, and grow once again. But they cannot complete their mission should their key pieces no longer be in play.”

“You’re absolutely  _ insane _ ,” Rin said incredulously. “You’re going to kill four kids to stop kids from being killed? What is wrong with you?”

“The alternative is leaving the world to be razed by that demon beast!” Akaba spat, his eyes flaring suddenly with a wild, angry light. Yuya shivered.

“Rin, we might need to make a break for it,” he hissed into her ear.

She tightened her jaw, but she didn’t make a move just yet. She sidled along the side of the wall one imperceptible step at a time, keeping Yuya and Yuto behind her, her arms outstretched.

“Tonight — tonight, it all must end,” Akaba said, his voice fumbling into an almost crazed mumble. “Tonight, I will make it up to her, for not being able to save her. I’ll help her put an end to all of this.”

Yuya and Yuto exchanged a quick, horrified glance. Whatever was going on here...

“You’re crazy,” Rin said again, eyes fixed on him. “Your daughter is dead. I’m sorry, losing someone is  _ terrible _ . But she’s not here. She doesn’t need you to avenge her. She needs you to live.”

Akaba shook his head.

“No,” he said, his voice suddenly thin and raspy, like someone who had just crawled out of a hospital bed. His hands shook more than before, the gun barrel starting to bob up and down. “She called me here. She put years of work into this, preparing for the day that it would all come to fruit, and she finally called me, to come and assist her, to make up for what I have done.”

Yuya felt a chill pass through him.

“She spent years crafting her return,” he continued. “Years infiltrating the only mind who would hear her voice, using her hands to change the preparations for the ritual — so that they would summon her, instead.”

A terrible, hollow sensation opened up in Yuya. The tunnels. The tunnels that were wrong. That had been changed ever so slightly over time, changing the building pattern until they were so far removed from the original that you couldn’t recognize them, and yet no one had noticed. It was starting to slot into place. But...to admit that he was starting to understand meant...

_ Do I...believe in demons? _ he thought suddenly.

“You need  _ help _ ,” Rin said.

“I need to atone for my sins by completing the task my daughter has given me,” Akaba said.

The barrel of his gun tilted down as he reached inside of his jacket, beginning to pull something flat and silver from inside his jacket.

Rin bolted. Luckily, Yuya was in tune enough with her movements to shoot after her, keeping one hand on her back to stave off the eerily alluring sensations of the steaming pit. Yuto managed to keep up, too, as they hurtled for the opposite tunnel.

A bang rang over the corridor, but none of them stopped, so the shot must not have hit. A second shot, and Yuto yelled, his hand dropping from Rin’s shoulder as he careened to the ground.

Rin skidded to a stop, and Yuya dropped his hand from her back. Immediately, the sticky feeling began to crawl back beneath his skin, tangling his thoughts up in spiderwebs of chanting and moaning and distant demonic laughter.

Yuto had collapsed to the floor, clutching at his leg — even as his eyes began to blur out as the chanting clearly began to take over him again. Rin swore.

Akaba was loading another shot, and Rin bolted for Yuto. She yanked on his arms and threw him over her shoulders like a sack of potatoes, not listening to his cry of pain.

“Help me!!” Rin screamed, and Yuya pushed through the molasses of his thoughts just enough to run to her, grabbing hold of both her and Yuto to support them. Once the chanting was gone, they were able to run, bolting into the corridor. “Tell me which way to go!!”

Yuya gasped out directions, hoping he remembered the map correctly — but there was no stopping now, no second-guessing.

He felt something warm trickle down his arm from Yuto’s body, but he didn’t let himself think about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys, thanks for your patience!! I've had something of a time of it recently that forced me to take a short break on this;;;; I apologize for not being able to finish it in time for spooky season, but rest assured that it WILL be finished, no matter how long it takes (how many of y'all remember me finishing one Halloween special in February lol? I promise it won't take THAT long this time xD)
> 
> Thanks for your support and kind words thus far and I hope you'll continue to enjoy the story!


	16. Chapter 16

Logically, Reiji knew he shouldn’t let Reira be the one to lead them through the maze — logically, he ought to take what he could get and get the hell out of there, and call the authorities to help the others who were still trapped here.

But tonight no longer seemed to be the kind for logic. He clung to Reira’s hand as his younger sibling led them through the endless corridors of the motel, moving with a strange assurance that Reira had never had before.

Kurosaki was walking a little better now that the bleeding had been somewhat staved, though Ruri still supported him. Reiji had suggested that the two of them go to Reiji’s car, get out and get help. But both had refused on account of their friend, Yuto, still being here, and not wanting to abandon him. Reiji sighed. Why was everyone on this ill-conceived adventure such terrible, sacrificial bleeding hearts?

_ That includes you _ , he thought at himself, who really ought to have been the logical businessman that he was  _ supposed _ to be and gotten himself and Reira out of here. But, like Kurosaki and Ruri...there were people here he couldn’t leave behind.

_ “We can’t leave anyway,” _ Reira had said, in that strange, solemn voice they had taken to reverting to when strange truths seemed to spill out of them.  _ “Oneesama won’t let anyone leave until she’s finished.” _

Reiji didn’t want to dwell on that. He didn’t want to dwell on a  _ lot _ of things. He could understand the idea of a lunatic cult that believed in demons and would kill innocent people in order to achieve their goals — he could even understand his father going mad and believing something was happening here that related to the vengeful spirit of Ray, to some degree. What he wasn’t sure how to wrap his mind around, yet, was the idea that the demons might be  _ real _ .

_ You saw that monster _ , he reminded himself.  _ What else could that be, if not a demon? _

And Reira...Reira was seldom so self-assured about anything. Whatever was happening, Reira had some knowledge that Reiji wasn’t privy to. If they wanted to get out of here...they were going to have to get to the bottom of it, and that meant Reiji would have to trust the strange, eerie sixth sense that Reira seemed to have.

Reira stopped in the hall, then, shivering slightly. They squeezed Reiji’s hand, and Reiji frowned, squinting.

“Are those...mirrors?” he said, almost to himself.

Beside them, Ruri stiffened, as though something had nearly struck her. Kurosaki put a hand on her back, frowning at what had caught Reiji’s attention.

Mirrors hung all along the walls of the hallway just ahead of them. There was one between each and every door, each mirror reflecting the one across from it. Unlike the walls and floor around them, they weren’t dusty, suggesting they’d been hung recently. But why?

“Ruri?” Kurosaki said in a concerned tone, and Reiji glanced back at the pair of them. “Are you okay?”

“I’m...fine,” Ruri said. “I just...something about those...”

She squinted, frowning as though she were trying to recall the answer to a particularly difficult math problem.

“I can’t quite remember,” she said in a small voice. She began to push her hands down her arms, as though trying to rub the blood off of her. Kurosaki hadn’t said anything about it after he’d confirmed she was all right, but Reiji noted the way his brows furrowed together when he glanced at the stains again, clearly wanting to ask, but not wanting to distress his sister even more. “Something about them just feels bad.”

“We should avoid them,” Reira said, squeezing Reiji’s hand. “At least, Ruri-san should.”

Reiji didn’t understand, but it came out in that strangely calm, quiet voice that Reira seemed to reserve for expressing the revelations of their sixth sense. Reiji considered the mirrors from a distance, thinking what they could mean. Could they be one-way mirrors, with people on the other sides watching them? No, they appeared to be hung from the walls, not set into them. Were there cameras, or traps of some kind, lying in wait within them? He couldn’t see how, each one looked to be a single thin pane of glass.

Perhaps there was no use in trying to understand what it meant. Releasing Reira’s hand, he moved towards the first set of mirrors and examined them briefly. They were nothing more than a cheap set of panes, like something you might find in the clearance section at a home good store. He reached up to grip the mirror in his hands, his own reflection moving with him, as he carefully lifted it. As expected, the mirror lifted up, and he pulled it down to the floor once the string on the back of it had come off the nail. He turned it around towards the wall, and the back was a plain, unreflective white.

“This will take a while, Reira,” Reiji said. “Are you sure we must avoid them?”

“I can just...crawl underneath them?” Ruri said.

Reira bit their lip, shifting from foot to foot.

“As long as you can’t see yourself in them, I think it’s okay,” they said after a beat.

“This is bullshit,” said Kurosaki. “They’re just  _ mirrors.  _ I’ll walk down and break every single one of them if it’ll get us to the others faster.”

“That’s bad luck,” Reira said in a very small voice.

Kurosaki only rolled his eyes, but he didn’t make a move to actually go about breaking the mirrors. He softened, however, when he saw Ruri’s quiet withdrawal.

“I think...I think Reira-kun is right,” she said. “I...the last thing I remember before I woke up with...” she trailed off, staring at her still stained hands, then shook herself back. “The last thing I remember is seeing my own reflection. I think...perhaps it’s connected.”

“This is all bullshit,” Kurosaki said, but there was less of an edge to it. 

Carefully, Ruri approached near the first set of mirrors. The way they hung, she could sort of stoop to duck beneath them, not catching her own reflection inside of them, and then stand back up on the other side where the doors were. She let out a low breath.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “But I think it’s going to be a bit slow going.”

They made it to the end of the hall this way, Ruri stooping and standing until she started to get a little out of breath, and Kurosaki tried to support her despite his own weakened body.

At the end of the hall, Reiji found that there were two paths this time. He glanced down both. His lips pressed together to see another hallway full of hanging mirrors to the left of them. What were the mirrors  _ for _ ? Where had they come from?

The right had only a few mirrors, not one every other set of doors. Reira took them down this one, and Ruri had to do much less stooping.

When Reiji thought he might go  _ insane _ from the pace, they reached the end of the next hallway — and he stopped them in place before he had even registered the sound up ahead.

“Footsteps,” he said. “Everyone back —”

Before they could back up, however, the owners of the footsteps came staggering around the hall — and Reiji sucked in a breath. Across from him, Yuya stumbled to a stop, his eyes widening, body sagging beneath the weight of the person thrown over his shoulders. A girl with the same face as Yuzu and Ruri stumbled around beside him, trying and failing to support the boy’s back with both hands. Her face was smeared with a bit of blood, but it didn’t appear to be her own. Her eyes widened at the sight of them, and she tried to drag Yuya and the other boy back instinctively.

“Yuto!” Ruri cried, her voice breaking, and she staggered forward.

“Ruri? Oh, god, you’re okay,” the green-haired girl said. “Aaaand you are  _ covered _ in blood — what the hell is with all the  _ blood _ —”

“Fuck,  _ Yuto _ ,” Kurosaki swore, following on Ruri’s heels.

“Oh, thank  _ god _ ,” said Yuya, his knees trembling as though he might collapse upon the sight of Reiji.

Reiji released Reira’s hand in order to hurry forward, grabbing Yuya under the arms to support him while Ruri and Kurosaki helped Yuto off of his back along with the green-haired girl.

“I’m...I’m fine,” Yuto mumbled. “Really, I just — it’s just my leg, nothing serious, I’m just having trouble walking —”

“It was that bastard, wasn’t it?” Kurosaki swore. “That bastard Akaba! He shot you, didn’t he?”

“Um, yeah, Reiji, uh,” Yuya said, gasping for breath as he gripped at Reiji’s elbows, letting Reiji grip him back. “By the way. Your dad is trying to shoot us.”

“Is he  _ here _ ?” Reiji said, peering towards the hallway corner as though he might suddenly appear — he didn’t even know what his father would  _ look _ like anymore. The last time he had seen him, he’d been in a near-vegetative state in the hospital, gaunt and hollow-cheeked with his eyes glazed over.

“He’s probably close, I don’t think we kept too far ahead of him,” said the green-haired girl, panting. “Maybe one of you could help us carry him so that we can move a little faster??”

Reiji nodded sharply. He stood, pulling Yuya up to his feet and making sure he was steady before moving quickly to Yuto. Blood ran down his leg, trailing behind him in little droplets, and he was clearly favoring the one over the other.

“It’s — it looks worse than it is,” said Yuto. “We don’t have time to dress it.”

Reiji wanted to argue. They had no idea if he had been hit in an artery or not. For all he knew, this boy could be dying right in front of him. But he checked around the corner for signs of pursuit.

He looked just in time to see his father emerge around the corner at the far end of the hallway, a shotgun in his arms and another on his back. He looked healthier than Reiji had ever seen him, as though most of his weight had returned to him in less than a day. The fast, clipped movement of his walk, too, was far too healthy for someone who had been in the hospital for six years. Reiji’s skin crawled — something about this was  _ wrong _ in a way he couldn’t express.

Reiji had spent years mourning the veritable loss of his father along with his sister. To see him like this...despite the wrongness, it made something in Reiji feel like the child he had been, before the tragedy had stripped him of all vestiges of childhood. But the others were right — his father was on a mission to hurt people. 

Reiji wasn’t going to let him do so.

“Run,” he said. “Take care of Reira. I’m going to stall him.”

“Are you crazy?” said the green-haired girl, bug-eyed.

“I’m his son,” Reiji said. “And he’s already lost one child.”

He didn’t recognize the cold look on his father’s face, or the tension in his body, or anything about him — as though there were someone else riding in his body. He didn’t have anything to prove that his father would care about his life at all, or if he would only care about his revenge.

_ All I have is hope.  _

_ Not that that has done much for me in the past. _

“It’s the best option. You can’t move quickly enough, even with me assisting you. Now go, and stop wasting more time.”

“Reiji —” Yuya started, eyes widening with fear.

“Go!”

Kurosaki grunted his agreement, though he shot Reiji a short nod, that might have been respect. He grabbed Yuto under the arm on one side, and Ruri took the other. Yuya grabbed Reira’s hand, shooting Reiji one more horrified, pained look. But he moved when the others did, and Reiji breathed out a sigh of relief.

He stepped fully around the corner so that his father could see him.

Now he would see if his familial bond had any weight.

* * *

Leo’s body felt stronger than it ever had, even before he had been in the hospital. The force pulsed through him — not his own, a gift from his daughter. He still remembered the girl walking into his hospital room that night, so like his daughter had been when she was that age, and yet not the same. He remembered the way one of her eyes bled to a full black, how half of her mouth had moved to let out halting words in a voice he thought he would never hear again.

_ “Papa,” _ Ray had whispered.  _ “Do you want to help me?” _

Of course he did. There was no other option but to atone for what he had done, how he had failed to save his daughter’s life. He had taken the hand extended to him, and she had breathed the black smoke from the girl’s lips and into his eyes, just a fragment of her overwhelming power.

Something had to be taken, in exchange. It was the way it worked. But he did not remember what it was that she had taken. It didn’t matter. She could have his life, his soul, if that was the price for avenging her. Even if she should drag him into hell...it was the least he could do for her.

The power she had granted his time withered body was soft, as well — not at all like the horrible, pressured feeling of that other demon that had once tried to take his body for its own. His daughter may be a demon — but unlike that  _ thing _ , she was not a monster.

He glanced at the floor, noting the speckles of blood that led the way after his prey. He would do as she requested. He would destroy the vessels, so that that monster could not arise within this world. He would...

“Father?”

The voice broke through the haze within him, and his eyes refocused on something other than the blood. His body tensed in spite of himself, against his will. He stared at the young man who stood in his way, and his hands tightened on his gun, though he would not point it at him.

Reiji looked pale, but other than that, his face was set, calm. He had always been like that, even before.... Always strong, quiet, able to seal his emotions away behind his eyes in breath, so that no one would read him. It was something that Leo had always been proud of, back then. He would make an excellent heir to the company, since Ray had no interest in — but he was thinking of the past. The past no longer existed.

“Reiji,” he said, his voice feeling hoarse. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same,” Reiji said, his eyes flicking down to the gun in Leo’s arms, then to the one on his back. “Father. What is going on?”

Leo’s lips tightened. Then he slumped slightly. Reiji was...he was still so young. He had been hurt, too, by Ray — he had sealed it off, tightly, deep within him, where no one could see it. But even his old talent at concealing his emotion was nothing like how Ray’s death had affected him. During his visits to the hospital, Reiji had seemed colder, farther away from himself every time. Not so much closed off anymore, as...empty. 

Of course he, too, had been seeking answers. To why Ray had to die. To who had killed her. Of course, he, too, had been seeking revenge.

Leo lowered his gun, and walked towards his son. It had been years since he had stood beside him, seen him from any other vantage point than from sitting in his hospital bed, with Reiji in the chair beside him. He had grown. He was almost as tall as Leo. He must be in college by now. Leo had missed so much, because of the monsters that had stolen not only his daughter from him, but everything.

“You must have been tracking them as well,” Leo said. “The cult.”

“That much I understand,” Reiji said. “I have learned a little of what happened. Of why Ray died. Of what happened to you.”

His brows furrowed, ever so slightly, nearly able to look his father dead in the eyes without looking up too much.

“What I don’t understand is what you are...what you are trying to accomplish,” Reiji said. “You shot someone, father. And not the ones who killed Ray. You shot an innocent young man who was as much victim as Ray was.”

Leo felt something in him tighten. But no, he chided himself. He must be calm. Reiji was still young. He was smart; he would listen, and he would understand. He had told those other children that if Reiji knew the truth, he would not be their friend. And he knew it would be true.

“Reiji,” he said, putting a hand on Reiji’s shoulder and squeezing. “I am very proud of you, my son. For making it this far. I wish I had more time to explain to you everything that is happening — but your sister can only give me the strength to do this for so long.”

Reiji’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly, but he was still listening. He did not push his father’s hand from his shoulder.

“Please try,” he said. “Time or no time. I need to understand what is happening in that mind of yours.”

Leo nodded. Reiji deserved that much, as much as Leo was able to give him.

“The ritual to summon that monster, Zarc, failed six years ago,” he said. “But not because of the cult. Because of Ray.”

Reiji pressed his lips together, waiting.

“When she was killed, her spirit rose up, and protected me,” Leo said, moving his hand to his heart. His terrible, sinful heart, that dared to beat when Ray’s no longer did. He recomposed himself. “She forced the monster back, and then chased him into hell.”

He expected Reiji to object, to try and argue on the existence of demons, but he did not. Perhaps he had seen enough to sway his skeptical mind tonight already. Leo pushed on.

“It took her six years to regain enough power to come to this world,” Leo said. “And she is determined to make sure that no tragedy like her death ever happens again. I am to help her with that — you must be here because she wishes for your assistance, as well.”

“I understand that,” Reiji said, just a hint of emotion leaking into his tone to give it a bit of a snap. “What I  _ don’t _ understand is how killing other kidnapped victims achieves that goal!”

“The cult is far-reaching. Not all of their members are here tonight — as a safety measure,” Leo said. “If they fail tonight, the others will regroup and try again.”

“Then we hunt them down!”

“Reiji,” Leo said, squeezing his shoulder again. “You have a good heart. But you must understand — have you not considered why they need so many sacrifices and vessels this time?”

Reiji’s brows furrowed even deeper.

“As...failsafes,” he said. “In case one or more of then doesn’t work.”

“They have only a few moments in which the time is correct for the ritual tonight,” Leo said. “If the first one does not work, they will not have time to drag another victim to the altar.”

Just the faintest bit of confusion flickered in Reiji’s eyes, and Leo pressed his advantage.

“When Ray chased that monster into hell, she found that it wasn’t there,” he said. “She told me that she could not find the demon that called for her death. It took her years to determine the truth — the demon was never  _ there _ . It was always  _ here _ . Hiding, in plain sight, waiting to be reawakened.”

“Father, this is —”

“Those vessels have the blood of demons within them,” Leo said, pushing forward. He let his gun hang from his chest as he gripped Reiji’s shoulders with both hands. “Combined with the blood of the girls who descend from those whose voices cross the veil, they will become  _ one _ . They will reclaim their lingering power from hell and reawaken as the monster who will destroy the world!”

“You are — Father, you are —”

“Reiji — do you want revenge for your sister? Do you not want to protect this world from the monsters that took her from us? You must  _ help _ me, Reiji. The only way to stop them is to destroy the sleeping demons before they can come into themselves.”

Reiji stared at his father, eyes wide, the anchors of his careful mask slipping. Leo could see his breaths coming shorter, hands hovering over Leo’s atop his shoulders, as though uncertain of whether to push them away or not.

Reiji would understand. Reiji was an intelligent boy. He would do the right thing. He would do...

Reiji put his hands on top of Leo’s and slid them from his shoulders.

“Father, losing Ray hurt me as well,” he said, his jaw tight, words coming out through his teeth. “But  _ father _ — please understand. These sleeping demons you speak of — they have no idea. They are  _ human _ . They want no more part of this than you do. I agree we need to remove the tools from the cult’s hands — but to kill innocent lives because of a birthright they do not know? That they do not want? I cannot condone this, father. Please, listen to me.”

Leo’s hands slid to his sides, dragged by gravity as he found he could not hold them up. He stared at his son for a moment, hearing the words but not fully comprehending them. The power in his veins — Ray’s gift — felt as though it thickened, swelling his arteries and forcing his heart to pump faster.

“You would choose these demons over your sister?” he said quietly. “Over your family?”

“Father, this isn’t an us versus them scenario!” Reiji said, fixing his glasses. “We are in this  _ together _ . We are stronger when we work together to fight this threat!”

He didn’t understand. He wasn’t even trying to. He was — to throw away the memory of his sister — 

Leo let out a long, slow breath. The anger within him died, replaced only with pity. Those demons...they had gotten into his son’s head. Trying to turn them against each other. To drive a wedge between them, to force him to lose another child.

He would not allow this to be the case.

“I will make you see them for what they are, Reiji. But in the meantime...I cannot have you wasting any more of my time.”

Reiji immediately tensed, sliding his stance out a bit more, raising his arms as though he were getting ready to fight. Leo didn’t let him have the chance. He lifted his gun in one smooth motion, and struck the butt against the side of Reiji’s head. Reiji dropped immediately, eyes bulging with the pain of it — though he did not immediately pass out, dropping instead to his knees and catching himself on his hands as he swayed. He was stunned enough that he couldn’t fight Leo as Leo seized him by the collar of his shirt and dragged him towards the nearest motel room. He kicked the door open, and pulled a now faintly struggling Reiji inside.

Reiji wasn’t unathletic, but with Leo’s greater size and the power of Ray’s gift, he was far stronger than him. Reiji regained some of his faculties, enough to try to kick and punch, but Leo wrestled him down. He pinned his hands behind him and dragged a coil of rope around his wrists.

“F-father!” Reiji gasped, his yell coming out like a whisper. “Father, you can’t do this! This is madness!”

“You will stay here until I can come to safely collect you,” Leo said, quickly finishing the knots on Reiji’s wrists, and then fastening them to another rope around his ankles. That should hold him for now.

“If you leave me here like this, you only put me in more danger!!”

“That’s only if you keep shouting,” Leo said coldly. “So I suggest you quiet down.”

Satisfied that his son was securely fastened, he left him there, struggling, while he stalked back out into the hall and locked the door behind him.

He had wasted far too much time. The injured one couldn’t move fast, but he had already lost the trail.

He hefted his gun. Whatever it took, he would complete his mission. For Reiji, even if he would not accept it. And for Ray. 


	17. Chapter 17

Yugo prided himself on being pretty strong, and Yuuri was a beanpole, but he was starting to lose his steam, and fast. He could still hear the shrieking of the crazy possessed Not-Rin girls and wasn’t really sure how he’d managed to stay ahead of them, but he wasn’t complaining. He gasped for breath as he staggered one heavy step at a time down the hallway. His feet caught here and there in the worn, aging wood, and it was only a matter of time before he lost his footing completely, and collapsed with Yuuri on top of him — and then it would  _ really _ be over for both of them.

Yugo sucked in a shuddering breath, forcing himself a few more steps, and then a few more after that. Don’t stop.  _ Never _ stop. Think of — think of  _ Rin _ . Think of finding her again and seeing her and making it out of here and giving her a big hug and just holding on tight so that they’d never be separated again.

Despite the shrieking, the screaming, the terror that pulsed through him thinking of those girls who looked like Rin and yet weren’t, with expressions twisted with a paranormal, unnatural hatred and anger, he pressed on. He kept the image of  _ Rin _ ,  _ his _ Rin, her exasperated smile, her light punches against his arm when he said something that made her laugh, the snide retorts, her real giggle that would slip out of her without her intending to let it out. She wouldn’t give up — she’d definitely be okay!! And that meant  _ he  _ had to make sure that  _ he  _ was okay so that she wouldn’t worry and get herself into trouble. So he couldn’t fall down here! He wouldn’t! Not by a long shot!!

He staggered forward. His knees bowed underneath him, but he pushed on. His body was really beginning to protest, and there was only so much he could do to suppress the aching scream in his muscles that begged for him to stop. He had to....do...something...

“I-idiot,” Yuuri gasped into his ear, and Yugo realized with a snap that Yuuri had been trying to get his attention for a while, and Yugo simply hadn’t heard over the rush of blood in his ears. “Will you — use — your —  _ eyes _ .”

Yugo gasped, eyes lifting from the haze of  _ move forward move forward move forward _ . Yuuri had lifted one shaky hand towards what he had seen, and it took Yugo a moment to comprehend what he was looking at.

A door. An  _ open _ door. An open door that had  _ fresh air whispering from the outside. _

Heart hammering in his chest, Yugo got his second wind. With a fresh burst of energy, he bolted towards the door — towards freedom. A cry ripped from his throat as he charged forward, like a warrior rushing onto a battlefield — and then they were  _ out _ . Stumbling, tripping, and tumbling face first into the dirt and grass. 

Yuuri tumbled from Yugo’s grip as Yugo went down, the two of them both rolling from Yugo’s momentum. His face smacked into dirt, grass and soil getting into his mouth, and then his shoulder and elbow struck against something hard and rocky, shooting a spike of pain through him.

He laid, dizzy, for only a second, before the adrenaline made him lift himself back to his feet much sooner than he really should have for his health. His head swayed from the too fast movement, but it occurred to him in a small, tinny way that just because they were  _ outside _ didn’t mean they were  _ safe _ . There was nothing that said those girls couldn’t chase them outside — 

His vision finally cleared from the haze of movement and his too fast ascendance to his feet. He blinked, still swaying slightly as he stared at where the pair of them had emerged.

The exit had spilled them out onto what seemed to be a big stone patio. Yugo spat out dirt and blinked it from his eyes as he tried to make sense of it. It wasn’t actually stone so much as it was a bunch of flat rocks that had all been pounded into the earth to make a sort of flat surface, though one that was very systematically arranged, with grooves dug out of the stone in weird patterns and swirling designs. In the very center was a big, square rock with more of the same grooves — and all around them were great pillars, stuck into points along the circle like the edges of spokes in a wheel.

Yuuri coughed onto the stone beside him, and Yugo’s heart shuddered to see the blood staining it. Was he like — actually dying?? Oh shit, oh shit, oh  _ shit _ , what should he do?? Those girls were probably still following them out of the building, too — 

Yugo started to scramble over to him when something latched into his hair. His mouth opened to scream. The girls — the crazy possessed girls, they’d caught up —

A hand clamped down over his mouth as he was dragged to his feet, kicking and clawing at the hands that held him. The person swore in pain with Yugo’s strikes, and the voice was much deeper than the girls’ had been — not the same person?? Someone  _ else _ ?

“Dammit, how did they get out here? And one of them is fucking  _ bleeding _ !”

Black robed figures surrounded them almost in an instant, a sea of darkness rising up out of the night. Two of them grabbed Yuuri under the arms, hauling him up and pinning his wrists behind his back as someone checked his bloody wound.

“Is it overly damaged?” someone said tensely, and Yugo’s head jerked towards the voice — one of the only figures without their hood up stalked forward, looking pale and angry. He was a sallow man, with a pinched face and slick blond hair, and the others parted as though he were clearly in charge.

“The wound has stopped bleeding, High Priest Roget,” the one checking Yuuri said. “But it appears to have lost a lot of blood.”

“So long as the vessel is alive, that’s all that matters,” said Roget. “Dammit. This is all going to  _ hell _ , and before we’ve even summoned a demon.”

He whirled on the others standing in clumps around what Yugo was now realizing was a fucking demon pentagram. Holy  _ shit _ , this really was a demon summoning cult — the whole concept hadn’t really dawned on him until now, but now it felt overwhelmingly real.

“Get the vessel’s wound taken care of, and tie them into place. You, get back in there and find the other two vessels. The three of you, track down what happened to our damn sacrifices. And you two go along to get the Repository back under control. And  _ the rest of you _ , make sure our uninvited guests are properly  _ greeted _ .”

Yugo bit down hard on the hand that clamped over his mouth and the man swore, releasing his mouth.

“Let us go!!” Yugo yelled. “Let us go!”

Roget’s eyes flashed to him, a rage in his eyes that made even Yugo falter for a moment.

“Shut  _ up _ ,” Yugo’s captor hissed, striking him on the back of the head.

“Get them to their positions,” he snapped, and he whirled back towards the motel in a flash of his black cloak.

His captor wrestled Yugo’s hands behind his back, trying to tie them together. Yugo fought with everything he had, kicking, punching, screaming, biting at anything that got close to his fingers.

That was when someone screamed.

The grip on Yugo slackened as his captor’s attention whirled away. Yugo didn’t wait to find out what the screaming was for. He simply kicked back as hard as he could, launching himself forward. He landed on his knees, skidding slightly and tearing his pants against the stone, and then leaped to his feet. He shook off the half tied rope and charged towards Yuuri’s captors, barreling into them shoulders first. As soon as Yuuri was released, Yugo grabbed him under the arms and started to drag him towards the other side of the circle. 

He heard sounds he didn’t recognize and didn’t want to, soft, schlicking sounds, the splatter of blood against stone, screams, yells, painful shrieks, the thwumping of bodies falling to the ground. His heart shrieked up through his throat so loud that he thought he might have simply screamed. But he kept going, dragging himself and Yuuri backwards one step at a time — where he was going to go, he had no idea, but he knew they needed to  _ leave _ — 

Yugo’s heel caught in the crack of a groove, and he tumbled backwards, dragging Yuuri on top of him as he landed heavily on his butt. The wind popped out of him and he gasped, tears springing to his eyes.

He saw another body hit the ground, as a knife left its chest, yanked free by the left hand of the blue haired girl who was already splattered almost head to toe in blood. Her endless black eyes were unseeing, and yet they seemed to burn when they turned towards the next cultist who attempted to advance on her with a gun drawn.

The bullets fired, but they didn’t strike her, or the girl whose hand she held — whether that was the man’s misplaced aim or a supernatural reason, Yugo had no idea. He was frozen, his heart choking him, his blood receding from every inch of him as he watched the girl casually slice the man’s hand, gun and all, from its wrist. 

He thought he must have fainted, at least for a second, at the sight of the blood and the sound of the screams, because his vision seemed to skip as though someone had hit a fast forward switch. **Yugo saw one of the figures break away from the mass, saw him stagger towards the woods on the other side of the circle while the girls skipped ahead to their next victim, the ponytail wielding the knife while the other girl acted as a deflector.

Yugo knew he needed to run. He needed to get up and flee. But he was frozen, suddenly, and Yuuri barely moved in his arms, and there was no way he was going to be able to lift himself to his feet.

The cultist who had fled — Roget, Yugo saw now — limped to the other end of the circle. He looked actually  _ terrified _ .

That was when the girls saw him, too. A shriek of rage erupted from both of their throats, as their final victim went collapsing to the ground, leaving them alone in a pile of bodies.

The pigtails girl released the other girl’s hand, taking the knife in the same motion, and bolted after him. The ponytail girl immediately collapsed to her knees, but the other kept running, at speeds too fast for a human, leaping over the bodies they had left behind.

Roget didn’t stand a chance. He shrieked when she seized him by the back of his cloak, flinging him to the ground.

“Did you think you could get away from me?” the girl said, her voice buzzing with a second one layered over the top of the sound that must have been her own. “Did you think that you could escape me?”

Roget only gaped at her like a fish as she slammed him down to the ground, landing on him with her knees digging into his chest.

“Do you remember me?” the girl said. “Do you remember watching me take a knife in my throat just like this?”

She didn’t wait for an answer. She only plunged the knife into his throat.

Yugo definitely didn’t have any love for this guy, and yet tears fled to his eyes, his breaths shortening as the blood poured out of the man’s twitching form. Maybe it was more from the fear than anything else. Yuuri had sucked in a choked breath at nearly the same time,so maybe he felt it too. 

How...almost anticlimactic his death had been, cut off without so much as a chance for a word. The blood now covering the girl’s knife and up her arms, staining her shirt and skirt, the way her black eyes now lifted up to Yugo and Yuuri. The way Yugo’s chest squeezed out all of his air as he knew that now the knife was coming for him, and Yuuri, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

He blinked back tears as the girl stood, leaving the body of her latest kill sprawled on the ground. She stalked towards them, with none of the speed that had overtaken the cult leader, as though she knew that they were incapable of escaping her. Yuuri’s breaths came short and fast, and Yugo’s own windpipe clenched. Was this really how he was going to die? Lost and scared in the middle of a horror game, murdered by a girl with the same face as his best friend, someone he would never, ever see again?

His tears rolled down his cheeks, fear and frustration mixing together. He curled his body over the top of Yuuri as much as he could, pulling his arms out from under him to try and hold them up. If he was going to die — he was at least going to go out trying to do something. Trying to fight, even a little. Trying to protect someone who couldn’t protect themselves.

The girl paused before them. Unlike her last victim, she didn’t throw herself directly into her attack, instead considering them as though curious.

“I-if you’re going to kill us,” Yugo said. “I’m gonna — gonna make it as hard as possible for you.”

Her lips quirked as though in a smirk, though her eyes remained black and unreadable. She crouched in front of them, and Yugo tried to position his body over Yuuri as much as possible, who seemed to have gone completely frozen — Yugo didn’t know if he was dead, or unconscious, or simply paralyzed with fear. The girl tilted her head at him, almost a little  _ too _ far, like farther than a human head should be able to turn.

“You aren’t what I expected,” she said, her voice crackling and buzzing as though there were radio interference coming out with her tongue. “After all I heard about you — I thought you were going to be a demon worth hunting down for revenge.”

Yugo didn’t pretend he knew what she was talking about. His mouth dropped open and he stared at her.

“I...I’m not a demon,” he croaked. For a moment, he dared to feel relieved. Was this just a case of mistaken identity???

But she coughed something that might have been a laugh.

“Cute,” she said. “Lying until the end, as though it might make me feel something like  _ pity _ for the monster you are. The monster you made of humanity. The monster you made of  _ me _ .”

Yugo yelped with pain when her hand latched into his hair, lifting him up as easily as though he were a sack of flour. Her bloody knife came to lay against his throat.

“I’d thought this battle would be more satisfying,” she hissed. “But you were never the all-powerful demon they said you were, were you? If you were, you wouldn’t be hiding here, in this world, splitting yourself into pieces so that no one could find you.”

The knife bit into Yugo’s throat, enough to draw blood, and a whine escaped him in spite of himself. He squirmed ever so slightly, but the fear kept him limp.

“Getting rid of you will be enough, though,” she whispered. “It will have to be enough.”

Her knife began to press ever deeper into Yugo’s neck and a burst of fear exploded in his chest, taking the form of an image at the back of his mind.

_ Rin _ .

He stared down at this girl’s face, so like Rin’s, so like the girl he — like the girl he  _ loved _ , the girl he loved more than anything, the girl he was never going to get to see again, who he would never know if she had made it out of here alive, if she would ever be able to be happy or smile that smile he loved so much again. He’d never hold her again, he’d never taste that kiss he’d been dreaming of having with her for so long, he’d never get to tell her again just how much she meant to him.

“Please!” he gasped, almost involuntarily, his hands shooting up to grip at her wrist. It was like clinging to a statue, so little did it move. “P-lease....”

“It’s too late for begging,” she hissed.

“Please just — Rin,” Yugo croaked, tears rolling down his cheeks. “Please!! The — the other girl, that looks like you — please just — promise me she’ll — she’ll be able to leave and go home and be safe! Please, that’s all I want, I just want Rin to be okay, I don’t want — I don’t want to go without knowing if she’s going to be —”

The blade faltered. It moved from his neck, just a hair, but a hair enough to stop feeling it pressed into his skin. Those black eyes were unchanging, deep, endless and horrifying, but something...something had changed in the girl’s face. The barest furrow of a brow, or the parting of a lip, Yugo didn’t know, he was crying so hard he couldn’t tell.

Then a ragged breath escaped the girl’s throat, and she released his hair. Her knife clattered to the ground along with his body, and he coughed and coughed, his hand pressed to his still bleeding throat.

Before him, the girl sagged to her knees, eyes fluttering — and when his own eyes cleared enough to see, he saw that they were no longer black. Regular blue eyes looked out from her face just before she keeled forward, landing heavily in Yugo’s arms.

Yugo didn’t know what had happened. If he was safe, if the girl was okay to be around, if Yuuri was alive, if anything was ever going to be okay again.

So he just sagged, and let the girl lean into his arms, and he closed his eyes as he tried to remember what it was like to breathe.

* * *

Reira suddenly stopped, eyes widening. They let go of Yuya’s hand and clapped their hands to their head as their whole body began to tremble. Yuya’s heart leaped. What was wrong with them?

“Um, Reira?” he said, trying to remember Reiji’s sibling’s name. “Reira, are you okay?”

“She’s so angry,” Reira whispered. “She’s  _ so _ angry.”

Tears bubbled to Reira’s eyes, and their breaths started to come like whistles, fast and shallow. Yuya’s own breaths began to get shallower. He swung his head back towards the others. Kurosaki had Yuto slung over both his shoulders now, like a sack of potatoes, and despite his own wounds didn’t seem to be slowing down. His eyes narrowed towards Reira, with concern or uncertainty, Yuya wasn’t sure. Ruri bit her lip brow furrowed, and Rin shook her head.

“Kid, we don’t have time,” she said. “We need to find a way out of here!”

“There’s no way out,” Reira whispered. “Oneesama won’t let us leave...not until she’s...”

They choked on their words and clapped their hands over their mouth, squeezing their eyes shut and trembling. Yuya had even less of an idea of what was going on, now. What was the bigger threat, here? The cult who wanted to turn him and the other boys into a demon, and sacrifice the girls? Reiji’s father, determined to kill Yuya and the others? The so-called demon of Reiji’s big sister, who wanted to...what? Kill Yuya and the boys? Why? Yuya’s eyes flooded briefly with frustrated tears. What was he supposed to do? What were any of them supposed to do?? He’d never asked for this!! He’d never asked to...to have some kind of demonic blood!

A distant, echoing roar shook the walls of the building, and Rin’s eyes widened, her pupils dilating with fear.

“Oh god,” she swore. “Is that...?”

The sound sent a cutting feeling through Yuya that he wasn’t sure was just fear. It was like his blood started to bubble beneath his skin for a moment, and he had to hug himself to try and wish away the feeling. He sucked in a breath to try and calm himself, but it was as though the sound had awakened something in him, something close to what Selena’s voice had done to him and the others before, but...different. It was less of a blinding feeling, and more of...like something in him was waking up, rearing its head back in understanding to the sound that he otherwise didn’t know. He shivered.

This was bullshit! All of it!! They were trapped in a horror movie with no answers, no way out, and no sign of half of their lost friends and allies! Reiji had sacrificed himself to buy them time, but for what? If they couldn’t leave, what then? How were they supposed to  _ win _ ?

_ Is there really no way out of this?  _ he thought, despair beginning to leak into him.

A second roar rattled the walls, and Rin swore.

“Oh god, it is,” she mumbled. “It’s that monster thing.”

Yuya didn’t know what she was talking about, and he was sure he didn’t want to. But once again, his blood seemed to roil at the sound of the roaring. And all at once, Yuya knew what the feeling that rose up in him was. 

It was a desire to fight.

He didn’t know if it came from himself, or if that roar had awoken something strange in him. He wasn’t sure. But he clung to that feeling in place of despair. 

He reached for Reira’s hand again, taking it and kneeling in front of them so that they were at eye level.

“Can you hear all of that?” he said. “The sound of...of Ray?”

Reira’s wide eyes were so full of fear. But they nodded. Yuya squeezed their hands and smiled his most brilliant smile he could manage.  _ Smile _ , he told himself.  _ Even when things look dark. Smile instead of despairing, and you’ll see a way out _ .

“Okay,” he said. “Can you tell us what you hear?”

Reira bit their lip, and for a moment, Yuya thought they were panicking again. But it seemed that they were just listening, as they slowly began to speak, as though repeating what they heard off a glitchy radio channel.

“She...she says that she’s really angry,” Reira said. “It’s not really...words. It’s more emotions. All over the place. She’s...confused and lost.”

“She’s trying to kill us,” Rin said.

Reira shook their head.

“Not you,” said Reira. “Just...just the vessels of Zarc. She’s trying to...protect you. And Yuzu, and Ruri, and Selena.”

Rin blinked, lips parting, and Ruri clenched her hands against her chest.

“Why?” said Kurosaki, eyes narrowing.

“Because...because she remembers being a sacrifice,” Reira said. “She was so scared. It hurt so much. She doesn’t want that to happen to anyone else.”

“Well, she’s trying to kill my best friend to do that!” Rin said, her eyes flashing. “Can you talk back to her?? Tell her to see some damn reason?”

Reira shook their head, eyes downcast. Yuya squeezed their shoulder with one hand. 

“Hey, it’s okay,” he said, reassuringly. “I know. This has got to be really hard, right? She was...she  _ is _ your sister.”

Reira’s eyes got glassy with tears, and they quickly rubbed at them with their palms.

“She’s not like she was,” Reira said. “She can’t hear me. She doesn’t want to hear me...but she wanted her family to be here, so that they could see her get her revenge.”

Yuya nodded, trying to make it all make sense.

“Is there a way you think we can talk to her?” Yuya said. “A way we can calm her down? Explain to her?”

Reira looked even more distraught, their whole body shaking.

“I don’t know!” they said. “She’s so...she’s so angry! She’s so... _ scared _ .”

Reira ground the heels of their hands into their eyes and began to cry.

“There’s got to be something,” Kurosaki said. “Something we can do to get out of here!”

“Oneesama has trapped us into the moment when she died,” Reira mumbled, still covering their eyes. “We don’t get to leave until...until she does.”

“Then we have to send her back,” said Rin. “Is there a way to do that?”

Kurosaki snorted.

“That old man would have said some shit like, not unless you’re a priest or an exorcist,” he said. “We don’t have any of those.”

Yuya sucked in a thin breath then, a terrible idea occuring to him.

“That portal,” he said slowly. “That’s where Ray is getting her power, right? Where she’s coming from?”

Reira peeked between their fingers. They seemed to listen for a moment. Then they nodded slowly.

“So what if we closed that portal?” Yuya said. “There’s got to be a way, right? They had to open it somehow — so there has to be a way to close it. Cut it off.”

Reira let their hands drop from their eyes, biting their lip. They wrinkled their nose, seemingly listening even harder than before. No one spoke, as though everyone was holding their breath in the wake of the answer.

Reira’s shoulders slowly, slowly slumped.

“I’m not sure,” they said. “The way oneesama’s mind is right now...it’s hard to tell. She’s so  _ powerful _ ...I think...maybe only a demon as powerful as she is would be able to close it.”

The news hung in the air, sobering Yuya’s sudden sense of possibility for just a moment. Automatically, he reached for the pendulum around his neck, a gift from his father so long ago that he barely remembered it.  _ Life is like a pendulum _ , he’d said to him back then.

They’d been swinging one way for so long, Yuya thought. They had to find a way to swing things back in their favor. The cold of the metal and crystal bit into his palm, and he sucked in a thin breath. There had to be...something...

Something clicked into place along with the sudden heat in his blood. A terrible, awful idea. One that he didn’t even know if it would work. But if...but if he could...

It was a gamble. The wildest, stupidest risk they could ever take. And yet...at this point, what did they have to lose?

He opened his mouth, his terrible plan ready to spill out into a group that would almost certainly balk against it. And then Ruri screamed.

Yuya heard a gunshot echo over their heads, too wide to have hit a target, but enough to try to make them scatter. Rin shot forward, throwing her arms out wide as though to shield everyone.

“You’ll have to shoot me first, you bastard!” she screamed. “Shoot me first!!”

Yuya surged to his feet, pushing Reira behind him and throwing his hands up in front of his face as though he could defend from a bullet like that. Kurosaki staggered backwards, holding one arm out to shield Yuya, the other holding a slightly squirming Yuto tightly to his back.

Yuya could only barely see around the people who had leaped up in front of him, but he managed to get a glimpse of Akaba Leo, gun raised up and aimed towards them. His face tightened as he tried to move it around Rin, but Rin kept moving in its way. Yuya’s heart screamed in his chest — sure, Leo didn’t want to kill Rin  _ now _ , but as soon as he gave up on trying to save her, she was putting herself in danger!

He tried to move forward, but Reira’s hand tightened on his, keeping him in place. Leo’s face twisted, expression furrowing.

“Just put the damn gun down!” Rin shouted, arms still out wide. “Stop this crazy bullshit!!”

For just a moment, it actually seemed like Leo was going to, to Yuya’s shock. The barrel of his gun tilted down, and one of his hands released the gun.

But Ruri gasped softly. In a sudden, whirling motion in a streak of hair, Ruri was shoving Rin behind her.

“Run,” Ruri gasped.

And then Leo tilted the hand mirror from his belt right at Ruri’s wide-eyed face, and Yuya caught the glitter of her reflection. And he watched as Ruri’s eyes suddenly stained black, and her whole body began to tremble.

“Run!!” Yuya repeated, grabbing Reira’s hand and bolting.

Kurosaki swore, trying to go for his sister. But Rin caught on fast. Her face pale, she launched herself at Kurosaki and began to drag him down the hall.

“It’s not Ruri!! It’s not Ruri!” Rin screamed at him. “Run, run, run!”

Yuya didn’t look behind him, didn’t check to see if Ruri now chased them, or if it had been only a trick of the light, or anything else. He only ran until his heart thought it might burst.

“Reira!” he cried over the rush of blood in his ears. “Can you navigate this place?”

He thought he saw Reira nod as they stumbled along beside him, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Guide us out!” Yuya yelled. “Get us to the place where they were going to summon the demon!”


	18. Chapter 18

She stood, stock still for a moment, only staring at her reflection — at her black eyes in a hollow face, framed with dark hair long and mussed and coming out of its ties. The girl whose face she wore looked gaunt, now. Tired. Though she herself felt no pain, she could feel the tremble in these arms, these limbs, the exhaustion that clung to her.

And as she stared into her own pitch black eyes, she thought for a moment that she saw that boy’s face again. Thought she heard him begging, not for his own life, but...for hers. For the girl. For one of the sacrifices. She could still see uncontrolled sobbing, the blubbering, the way his face went red with panic for someone else.

_ Can. _

_ Can a monster feel things like that? _

“Ray?”

The voice of her father, smaller than it should be, drew her back to the body she inhabited, the mission she had to complete. The image of the boy dissipated — though the roiling, uncertain feelings it had inspired within her did not. Ray grit her teeth.

A lie. It must have just been another clever lie — that monster, the kind of monster that would murder her, that would reduce her father to the small thing he was, that would destroy her family, that would create a cult that would kill so indiscriminately — a monster like that couldn’t  _ feel _ things. It had been a bluff. An attempt to shake her — even after all this time, that monster was trying to ruin everything, her life, her death, even her revenge!

Anger roiled up within her, anger at herself for being tricked, at the monster for tricking her, at every sordid event that had led to this final night. The anger roiled like a heat around her, turning her former cold into a cracking fire that rose from her skin and made her vessel’s hair begin to flap as though a wind had blown about her. 

When she next saw her reflection in the mirror, her eyes were no longer black. 

Now, they were doors to an endless realm of fire.

Her father tensed, but he did not flinch away from her. Ray steadied herself, sucked in a hot, smoldering breath, and let out a faint gust of wind and flame that hung, briefly, in the air before vanishing to a mote of ash that fell to the ground.

“They will pay for everything they have done,” she said, her voice vibrating with the crackling flames beneath it.

Her relaxed again, and he nodded, returning his mirror to his belt and taking up his gun again.

“You tell me where to go,” he said. “And I will do it.”

Ray nodded sharply. She turned on her heel, towards the hall where her prey had fled. She’d given them precious time, a headstart. But not for long.

* * *

Shun was beginning to flag, and Yuto could sense it. Beneath him, Shun’s body sagged, and his breaths came short and harsh. They were a good five feet behind Yuya, Reira, and Rin now, and Shun was losing ground with every step. He would have lost more ground if Yuya hadn’t noticed them, and had slowed down himself. Even Reira, with their short legs and flushed face, was keeping better pace than Shun. Yuto’s leg throbbed, and he barely felt the trickle of blood anymore — he didn’t know if that was because he had stopped bleeding, or if his leg had gone numb.

“Shun,” Yuto rasped. “Shun, you can’t...you can’t make it like this.”

“Don’t you fucking dare say another word,” Shun said. “Not another damn word!”

“We’re not leaving anyone behind with those psychos!” Rin said, eyes flashing.

“I’m slowing all of you down,” Yuto said. “I’m...”

He couldn’t get the rest out. A tremble began beneath his skin, not yet released outside of him, and fear tightened his throat so much he could hardly breathe. He remembered seeing Ruri’s reflection — the eyes staining back, her face going suddenly rigid, her body...not changing, but something about it  _ altering _ , as though somehow it took up more or less space than it actually did all of a sudden. The inexplicable feeling that Ruri was no longer there.

He closed his eyes around the tears, gasping. He was...he was  _ scared _ . He was so scared he could hardly breathe anymore. Even during the weeks they’d been imprisoned here, he hadn’t felt nearly as scared. It was like the world, everything he knew about reality, was crumbling around his ears.

Ruri had been taken over by a demon who wanted to kill him. Ruri...Ruri was going to...and Shun, Shun would never leave him, would never have the strength to defend himself from someone with his sister’s body, and he, too, would...all because he hadn’t been strong enough to stop the cultists from stuffing him and Ruri into that car all those weeks ago...

Shun kept going, one foot in front of the other, not stopping even though the others had. Another corner was only feet away, this one seeming to split off in two directions. Yuya’s looked up at the pair of them, pale with concern.

“I — what if I carry him for a bit?” said Yuya. “I’m stronger than I look.”

“You take care of that kid,” Shun said through grit teeth. “You’re a target too, dumbass — if both of you are together, she’ll gun straight for the pair of you.”

Yuto tightened his arms around Shun, closing his eyes and trying to breathe. It was so hard. He wanted to close his eyes, and to wake up in his bed and find that this was all a dream.

But the pain was real, and so was the angry shriek of the girl’s voice, both Ruri’s and not-Ruri’s all at once, echoing down the hall after them. Yuto’s eyes flew open. Rin’s face went white, Reira’s hood flew from their head in the motion of their whipping towards the sound, long bunched up lavender hair coming slightly free of their hoodie. Yuya snatched Reira by the shoulders, grabbing them up behind him.

“Go,” Shun gasped.

“We’re not leaving you guys,” said Rin.

“Get the hell out of here!” Shun roared at them. “She only wants Yuto and the others! If we split them up, we’ll split her attention!”

“She’ll go straight after you!!” Rin yelled.

“And then I’ll handle it! At the very least, we’re not going to fucking make this easy for her!! Now get the hell  _ out of here! _ ”

Yuya looked like he was getting ready to argue, too, but Shun made an attempt to kick at the three of them with one foot, more show than substance. Then he started staggering down the right hallway, leaving the others hovering, for just a beat, at the fork. Yuto twisted his head back towards them, wondering if this was the best idea for any of them, but uncertain if he should, or even  _ could _ , argue.

Finally, Rin swore. She grabbed Reira’s other hand, and began to pull them and Yuya down the opposite hall. Yuto pressed his head against the back of Shun’s neck, just trying to breathe.

“You...you should hide me somewhere and run,” Yuto said. “You can’t stay ahead of either of them like this.”

“That  _ thing _ will find you,” Shun said. “And she doesn’t care about me. Only about you. She won’t bother coming after me.”

Shun hefted Yuto higher against his back, and Yuto knew the tone in his voice. Arguing with him would be like arguing with a wall. Yuto dug his teeth into his lip. If Shun got hurt because of him...and what if it was true? What if he  _ was _ a demon just waiting to be woken up? And what if it happened, and he became something that would hurt Ruri and Shun, the way that that other demon had caused Ray’s death? 

What if it was the best option to simply let Ray kill him now?

Shun staggered onward, undeterred, sheer determination powering him past his limits. He wouldn’t be able to keep this up — Shun always pushed himself too hard, and felt the consequences later. But there was nothing Yuto could do one way or the other. He was so damn  _ helpless _ .

Mirrors hung on the walls on all sides of them, capturing their haggard reflections as they pushed forward. Yuto tried not to look into them, wondering if the way they had turned Ruri into Ray’s puppet would cause any danger to them, too, somehow — or worse, that they would reveal to him in perfect clarity just how much of a burden he had become to Shun, and to everyone.

His heart pounded in his ears so loudly that he didn’t hear her footsteps until he felt the heat of her breath against the back of his neck. Ruri’s fingers dug into his shoulders and neck, dragging him bodily off of Shun and flinging him to the floor. Shun staggered back along with the momentum. He swung around, swiping for Yuto’s flailing limbs as he went crashing to the floor, Ruri’s fingers with Ray’s strength behind them slamming him down into the thread-worn carpet.

“Ruri!” Shun cried, his voice cracking. “Ruri, you have to fight it! You have to fight it!”

Yuto’s head spun — for a moment, he saw only Ruri’s face, her eyes suddenly openings into an eternity of flames, lips curling with a snarl unlike anything he had ever before seen on her face. Then Shun grabbed her under the armpits, yanking her back. It must have been shock more than anything that caused her to be so easily subdued. Her mouth formed an O as Shun yanked her up and back, trying to twist her arms behind her back despite the pain in his face of manhandling his sister like this.

“Yuto, run!” Shun yelled. “Go!!”

“S-Shun, don’t,” Yuto gasped, and Ruri  _ shrieked _ . The sound ripped through the air itself, and for a moment Yuto thought he saw flames beginning to leak through tears in the empty space around her, licking at the walls and floor before vanishing like an afterimage. Yuto’s head pounded — it wasn’t just the fear or the pain, but something else, something like what he had felt down in the tunnels, a sticky feeling that clung to his skin and the inside of his lungs, the echo of something that might have been his heartbeat, or might have been chanting, rattling against his skull.

Shun wrestled with Ray/Ruri while she shrieked and kicked, and Yuto forced himself up. He couldn’t — he couldn’t get weight onto his leg. It screamed with fresh pain every time he shifted onto it, so he flung himself onto his hands and knees, dragging himself across the floor by his fingers. His lungs were on fire, stuffed full of some molasses-like substance that made each breath seem to bubble thickly in his chest.

Shun was trying his best to protect him, and if Yuto didn’t take advantage of the sacrifice Shun was making for him, Shun would never forgive him. Biting back hot tears, Yuto continued to drag himself one painful inch at a time, knowing in his bones that there was no way he could escape.

Shun yelled, and Ray/Ruri shrieked, and then he felt the heat of her crackling over him like a summer wind, and she slammed him face first into the ground. He did try his best to fight. He squirmed and kicked both legs up, but her weight against his back, her hand shoving his head to the floor, it was like fighting against a concrete block on his back.

“I will not allow you to keep escaping me, you  _ coward _ .” Ruri’s voice, so familiar to him,  _ thrummed _ with the layer of the other voice on top of it, causing his hair to raise on end. “I  _ will _ end this before you take another life!”

Yuto tried again to push up against the hands that held him, but the words cut through him like a knife, a reminder of his worried thoughts rising through him.

“Is...is it true?” he managed to squeeze from his tight lungs.

Ray/Ruri stilled a moment, and the heat seemed to recede just a breath. When she didn’t answer, he tried again.

“Is it true — I’m — am I really the demon who...who killed you?”

The heat receded to a faint buzz of warmth against his skin. A harsh breath escaped her mouth.

“All of you, still lying?” she said, her voice buzzing with hate. “Still thinking you can  _ lie _ to me? To make me believe you have no idea what you are?”

Her hands tightened on him, shoving him harder into the ground, squeezing the air out of him. He struggled just to breathe, tears squeezing from his eyes.

“Do you think you can fool me??” she said, her voice raising to a shriek, cracking at the end of her sentence. “Do you think you can — you can try to convince me to let you  _ live _ ? It’s too damn late to appeal to my better nature — you made damn sure of that!!”

Her voice was like a gale crashing around him, and he almost actually felt the wind. More tears caught in his eyelashes. He closed his eyes, and drew in a rattling breath.

He let himself fall limp, ceasing his struggling. He let his breaths slow, and he somehow felt as though the sticky feeling clinging to the inside of his skin began to melt away. He felt...clear.

“Okay,” he said. “O-okay, I...I won’t fight.”

Her hands loosened again, with shock, or something else, he didn’t know. He shook ever so slightly, the tears falling freely now into the carpet.

“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” he gasped. “I don’t want...just please...w-when you’re done, please take Ruri somewhere else before you let her go, I don’t...I don’t want her to blame herself; if she thinks she’s responsible for...for me dying, she’ll never forgive herself. Please, that’s all I ask.”

For a long, long moment, nothing happened. He closed his eyes and waited, wondering if it would be quick. If he would open his eyes again to a new place, or if his existence would simply end. His heart rattled the bars of his caged lungs. Too long. He was waiting too long. Why hadn’t she killed him yet?

Then overhead, he heard her take a long, rattling breath, a breath that thrummed with the sound of two voices, until...one of them simply tapered away, leaving only one behind.

Ruri coughed, letting go of Yuto and rolling herself off of him. She landed on the floor beside him, shuddering, her arms sprawled on either side of her. But her eyes were open, wide, her own magenta irises staring at the ceiling with a strange, distant sort of look.

“Ru...Ruri?” Yuto gasped.

Ruri blinked. Her fingers curled. She sucked in another long breath, steadier this time.

“I’ve got her,” she said, her voice so calm that it seemed somehow out of place. 

Yuto’s lips parted, the tremble in his limbs beginning to increase — whether from the shock of being alive, or from Ruri being herself again, or from everything crashing down on him...he didn’t know.

“What?” he croaked.

Ruri blinked again, and Yuto suddenly realized how still she was; how except for the rising and falling of her chest, as steady as a machine, the rest of her was stone still.

“Ray,” Ruri said. “I’ve got her. I’m holding her inside me. I’m not letting her go.”

She continued to breathe, continued to stay as still as possible, as though the slightest movement might turn her eyes to fire again.

“If I lose my concentration, she’ll take over again,” said Ruri. “But as long as I hold onto her, she can’t go to any of the others. I. I don’t know how long I can hold her.”

Somewhere in the distance, Shun swore a tired, cracked swear. Yuto only let his body melt, like jello, into the carpet.

* * *

Reiji fell over onto his side again, cursing under his breath. He didn’t dare make much more noise than he already was making —  _ anything _ could be out there in the halls. 

He twisted at his wrists again, causing his ankles to bend uncomfortably backwards. Dammit! He could hardly even move himself to any of the rotting furniture in the room to use to help free himself.

_ I’m an idiot _ , he thought over and over again. 

He and his father had never been particularly close. Father had always been working, always distant. He wasn’t  _ cruel _ , per say, but he had rarely taken much of an interest in Reiji’s life, save for a few approving nods or scolds depending on what his grades ended up being. And yet, Reiji had still thought perhaps their connection would be enough to sway his father to logic. Clearly, he had been wrong. His father was unrecognizable now. Logic had fled him.

Now he was the puppet of of something that could hardly be called his daughter, so much as an echo of her.

That stung, too, and he didn’t want to think about it. The thoughts forced their way into his mind anyway, forcing him to pay attention with little else to occupy himself. 

It had been years since he’d let himself think of Ray — truly think of her. He had spent years, of course, researching her death — until the woman she had been faded into nothing more than a concept, a person he saw in photos but could hardly remember himself. Remembering her had become too painful — focusing on research rather than on what had been taken away from their family, the life that had been ended too soon — that was the only way he could cope.

But even still, he couldn’t wrap his mind around it. His  _ sister _ . Ray. Becoming a creature that would demand the death of innocents in order to avenge herself.  _ Ray _ . His practical, logical, no-shit-taken sister, who despite her impulsive nature, would never strike against someone without being absolutely certain they deserved the punch.

Just the idea of her being even still... _ existing _ , much less in this twisted, sorry state...Reiji couldn’t accept it. If he managed to free himself from here, if he escaped and he found his father again, if he found  _ Ray _ ...

What would he do?

The thought made him stop trying to escape, if only for a breath. He stared at the rotting carpet, the dusty room, but he wasn’t seeing it. He saw only Ray. Her grin when she ruffled his hair. Her laugh when she scooped Reira up onto her shoulders and swung them around. The way she pretended she wasn’t crying during the end of a romcom. Throwing her cards at Reiji when he beat her in poker, but then laughing after and helping to pick them up.

And her body, twisted and broken, left to rot in a ditch.

No wonder she came back so angry.

Reiji twisted his wrists again, gritting his teeth. It might have been his imagination, but he thought perhaps the ropes were growing a bit looser. He’d put up a decent fight, and his father had been trying to move quickly. Perhaps a little bit more and he’d be able to squeeze out...

He didn’t know what he would do when he saw her. When he faced the anger that she so rightfully had, the anger that seemed to have utterly consumed everything he remembered of her. But he knew he  _ had _ to face her. He had to meet her again, and he had to hear it from her lips what she believed, what had become of her. 

If there was anything he could do...even if it was too late to save her...

He could not give up on her.

The ropes shifted on his wrists with the next twist, and he knew he had it. Careful, methodical, one breath at a time — there! One of his wrists was free!

As soon as one was out, the other came quickly after, and he was able to roll back up to a sitting position and release his ankles. He threw the rope aside and staggered to his feet — one breath, he told himself as he leaned against the remains of a counter. He got one breath to recollect himself, and then he had to — 

_ Boom _ .

His hand tightened on the counter, brow furrowing.

_ Boom _ .

The ground beneath him shook, slightly. He felt it vibrate up his feet, and up his hand leaned against the counter.

_ BOOM. _

The ceiling shook, now, dust shaking dow onto his hair. He looked up, as though perhaps it was coming from above.

_ BOOM — CRASHHH! _

The wall behind him exploded.

Reiji yelled, stumbling forward, throwing his hands over his head at the rain of wood and dust that billowed over him. He fell forward into the door. He snatched at the wood, leaning hard into it to steady himself. So much dust got into his eyes that for a moment, he couldn’t see. His glasses tilted on his face when he bumped into the door.

The floor  _ creaked _ , and Reiji suddenly knew exactly what had just crashed into the room.

He whipped his head back. 

The creature was so large that its head had burst through the ceiling of the low-hung motel room. Its whole body took took up the entire room — now that Reiji could see it in the dim light of the room, and not just as a hulking shadow in the forest, he could see it for all its horror now.

Shoulders as wide as two men laid end to end, with a waist that cinched to less than half that — metal pounded and nailed directly into the skin, accompanied by skin twisting scars that overtook every bare inch. It  _ was _ human, or at the very least, it had been once, before pieces had been welded onto it, patches of skin and flesh sewn in tight, mismatched stitches that seemed only barely to keep it together. Its square face was split with a wild, jagged grin, eyes huge — its one empty socket seemed somehow even more terrifying than the too-big, glowing red eye in the other, scars running all down its face.

And like it had back in the forest, its skin  _ bubbled _ . As though there were boiling water inside it instead of blood, it was bubbling and boiling as though its skin were as malleable as pudding, aching to release itself from around its metal prison, trying to push around the bars and sheets of metal nailed into the flesh. And some of — some of the bubbles looked like  _ faces _ . He saw the impressions of eyes and mouths in some of the bubbles that tried to force their way out of the skin, clawing at their prison with silent screams. Reiji threw up in his mouth and the bile dripped from his lips. For a moment, he thought he might pass out.

Then the creature, stooping under the ceiling to see him and grinning madly, reached one massive hand for him once again.

Reiji acted on instinct, and his instincts told him to run. He lost his footing and hit the ground as he fumbled for the door handle, and the creature’s hand punched straight through the door, sending it flying off its hinges. Reiji scrambled up onto his knees and practically flung himself through the newly open door frame, slipping and stumbling back onto his feet as he careened into the hallway.

The creature smashed through the wall behind him and the rush of debris that came with it nearly knocked him off his feet again. He managed to keep his footing and he kept going — he had no idea where he was going to go. But perhaps the creature wouldn’t be able to follow him as quickly, it seemed large and difficult to maneuver, and these hallways were fairly small — 

The ground  _ shook _ with the creature full out charging him. He nearly fell every time the ground quaked beneath him, and he could almost feel it’s breath on his back when he managed to careen around the next corner. The creature smashed into the wall rather than turn — it was fast, but couldn’t stop fast. That might be his only escape.

Reiji was fairly fit but even he was not ready for this much exercise today. He forced himself to the other end of the hall as the ground began to shake with the creature’s charge once again. Somewhere among the shaking and crashing, a whine began to fill the air. Was that his own heartbeat? His rushing blood? The panic in his head?

No, it seemed to becoming from outside of him. The whining was — it was like a thousand tiny voices, all hitting the exact same inhuman note. He remembered with a start Reira’s claim of hearing screaming when they first encountered this creature. What...what was this thing?

Reiji careened around the next corner, but this time, he lost his footing, sliding and smacking into the wall rather than turning. The creature was close — too close. He managed to throw himself to the side before it crashed directly into him, hitting the ground and bouncing off of it once. Pain rattled through him, temporarily stunning him.

The creature wrenched itself out of the hole it had made of the wall, staggering around to face his crumpled, still body. The bubbling was even worse now, and even its face was staring to bubble as well — each one of them truly looked like a face, now, a thousand tiny faces attempting to escape, pressing and fighting each other to get to the skin, to try and force their way out. The whining — no, the  _ screaming _ — grew louder, and he could hardly breathe.

The creature’s eye was wide, wild, and it  _ drooled _ as it reached for him. He tried to move — to at least roll himself away. But its speed picked up, and faster than he thought possible, it snatched him up in one huge hand. He yelled once, and then it began to squeeze.

One of his arms was free, the other crushed against his ribs by the creatures hand. He slammed his fist against the hand, clawed at it, tried to pry at the fingers. He could  _ feel _ awful sensation of the thousands of trapped faces all bubbling against his skin as they tried to escape through the palms of the creature. One face sprung up from the skin to almost his own face, and he heard the scream as though it were his own, before it was snapped back down into the creature’s body.

_ They’re trapped _ , he realized, horror spreading through him.  _ There’s something — inside it. They’re trapped in it. They’re trying to escape. _

The creature drooled with excitement as it pulled Reiji’s struggling form up to its face. It stared at him with the wide, malicious excitement of a child about to step on a bumblebee. Reiji tried to breathe through the crush against his ribs, but it was no good. He couldn’t get away. He couldn’t escape, anymore than the poor creatures screaming for release inside this creature’s body could.

He had only one last desperate option.

He tried to stop breathing, slumped forward, and played dead.


	19. Chapter 19

Reira tripped. 

Yuya heard them gasp, first, and then his arm yanked backwards with the momentum of their fall, dragging him backwards and sending him careening to the floor. 

He sat there a moment, dazed — from both the flight and the fall. Rin staggered to a stop just feet ahead of them at the sound of their collapse, whirling around with a flushed face and shaking chest.

“Are — is she — following?” Yuya gasped.

Rin’s eyes flickered down the hallway, her air coming in raspy gusts.

“I don’t — see her,” she said. She keeled forward, hands on her knees. “Honestly, fuck this.”

Yuya actually giggled, he was so winded and panicked. He let it pass then, closing his eyes and trying to recompose himself. If Shun and Yuto were currently distracting her...he didn’t want to think about that, about the idea that they might have sacrificed themselves. But whether they had, or hadn’t, they were buying them time. Time that Yuya needed to take advantage of.

“So...so what’s the plan?” Rin asked, pushing herself back up against the wall and leaning into it.

Yuya coughed, rattling his dry throat. 

“I...I have a stupid idea,” he said. 

“Good,” said Rin. “Because we ran out of good ones before the night even started.”

Yuya shakily got to his knees, turning to help Reira sit back up. The poor kid was utterly shot, their whole body shaking, tears in their eyes, white and drawn and looking far too old for their age with their huge, haunted eyes.

“Is niisama okay?” they mumbled, almost to themselves.

Yuya’s heart squeezed. Reiji’s back still hovered in his mind, the straight, stiff walk as he stalked to meet his father — to try and buy them time. To help them. But Leo had made it to them anyway. What did that mean? Leo hadn’t...he wouldn’t  _ kill _ Reiji, would he? But Reiji would never have let him past, not without a fight...he had to be all right, right?

_ Unless he...agrees _ , Yuya thought with a treacherous fear.  _ Unless his dad talked him around _ .

How well did he really know Reiji, anyway? They were just in the same theater club, they hung out with the same people, they talked on occasion but nothing deeper than the annoyances of college. Why would Reiji ever choose him and the others over his family? Why would he stick his neck out for them? What reason would he have? Yuya wouldn’t even know if he could blame him, if he’d come to the conclusion that his family was more important than they were.

And yet, Reira was here. And Reiji had trusted Yuya to take care of his younger sibling. And...and there was something about Reiji, something quiet and calm, something that had always drawn Yuya to him. Something that...well, for lack of a better way to express it, made Yuya feel like he was someone you could follow into battle. But maybe that was only Yuya imagining things...

Rin got her wind back, pushing herself from the wall. She rolled her arm back by the shoulder, as though winding up for a punch, and then repeated with the other arm. Then she let out an angry  _ ahhhhhghhh!!! _ and slapped her cheeks a few times.

“Okay!” she said, whirling on the pair of them. “I’m ready for your stupid idea!”

Yuya stood, too, helping Reira to stand by holding onto both of their hands. Their knees shook, but their footing held. Yuya bit into his lip, watching the brim of Reira’s hat rather than Rin, suddenly afraid to say his plan aloud. He didn’t know  _ Rin _ well at all, but if she was anything like Yuzu...she was not going to go along with this.

“Well? Spill,” said Rin. “Don’t hide it from me for some epic reveal later. I need to know what’s going on so I can help.”

Yuya had to say it out loud. Shit. He closed his eyes shut tight for a moment.

“Okay,” he said, a huge breath gusting out of his chest. “The thing is, I don’t even know if it’s going to work. We didn’t really learn much concrete from that study room.”

Rin frowned, but didn’t say anything, waiting for him to keep going. Yuya took another steadying breath, swaying slightly on his feet.

“That portal down there is the reason Ray can be here,” he said. “But the only way to close it...”

He glanced at Reira here, whose hand tightened against his.

“The only thing that can close it is a demon as powerful as Ray is,” he said. “So...”

Rin’s eyes suddenly bulged, and he didn’t even have to say it.

“Holy shit,” she breathed. “You’re not fucking serious.”

“You said it was time for stupid ideas,” Yuya said, smiling weakly.

“Yeah!! Stupid as it running full-tilt into a monster and punching it til it disappears! Not stupid as it — fucking trying to  _ summon a demon inside of yourself.” _

Yuya winced, and Reira’s eyes widened as they turned up towards him, clearly only now understanding Yuya’s plan.

“I can’t think of any other options!!” he said. “Ray won’t stop until me and the other guys are dead. So either we let her kill us and then go back to hell or wherever it is she came from, or we find a way to fight her.”

“You know, they call it fighting fire with fire because it’s a  _ bad _ idea,” said Rin. “This demon guy the bad guys are trying to summon is — he’s gonna end the world, or something, isn’t he?? And don’t you have to kill someone for that?”

“All the ritual said is you need  _ blood _ , not a murder,” said Yuya, though he really had no clue if that’s what it meant or not. “I thought maybe — if we just pricked your finger or something, maybe...”

“And the moon and shit needs to be right!” said Rin, throwing her hands into the air. “And the summoning circle and the pillars all have to be perfect, right??? What if any of its been destroyed all ready? Plus, you said yourself about those tunnels!! They were supposed to be for that apocalypse demon, but they got made for Ray instead!”

“I —”

And what happens after it possesses you? What if it doesn’t even close the portal? What if it just goes crazy with Ray and kills all of us??”

“I don’t know!” Yuya said, the words ripping out of him and leaving a jagged hole in their wake. “I don’t  _ know _ .”

Rin stopped arguing. Her hands fell to her sides. Yuya’s hands shook.

“I just...I can’t do anything,” Yuya said, his voice cracking. “There’s nothing I can do! I’m making it dangerous for both of you just by  _ being _ here, by being a target! But maybe there’s something I  _ can _ do. For you, and Reira, and everyone...and  _ Yuzu _ .”

He really lost his voice on that last word, and he squeezed his eyes shut against the sudden wash of tears that threatened to spill over. Rin went very quiet, and all Yuya could hear was his own attempt to keep the sobs in. Reira’s hand curled against his.

“Yuya,” Rin said, her voice coming out a bit muffled. When he looked at her, she had one hand pressed to her mouth, looking stubbornly away from him as she talked between her fingers. “You don’t have to go around  _ sacrificing _ yourself to do something for people.”

Something about the way she said it made him feel as though she were really talking to someone else. He opened his mouth, though what he meant to say, he had no idea.

Any semblance of thinking about it shattered when the shot rang out over their heads.

Rin yelled, moving to throw her arms out wide and shield Reira and Yuya. Yuya dragged Reira back against him as he stumbled back.

Leo stalked down the hallway, gun poised for another shot. Yuya wondered how many bullets he had, how long it would be before they could wait him out — or if that would matter, since it looked like Leo had the build of a man who could snap Yuya in half with his bare hands anyway.

“Enough of this,” Leo said through his teeth, eyes flashing. “Enough of this game you play, you foul creature.”

“Get back!” Rin yelled, arms out wide. “Stay away or I’ll make you shoot me instead!”

“You demons corrupt every single person you come across,” Leo said, his voice coming out rough and wild. “Manipulating all into  _ protecting _ you, into believing you’re innocent! Even my own  _ son _ you’ve turned against me — and now you’d use my child as your shield??”

Yuya’s arms tightened on Reira, his mouth drying up. Reira trembled in his arms, but they made no move to run towards their father, instead staring at him with unfiltered fear. His head spun — what if...what if it was true? What if he was actually some demon in disguise, so deftly hidden that even  _ he _ was fooled? Was he fooling everyone into protecting him and not even knowing it?

What if — what if his stupid idea to try to summon the demon was actually the impulse of his demon self, trying to awaken itself? What if...what if he didn’t even know himself? The possibility rooted him to the floor.

And...and Reiji. Leo said that Reiji had turned against him...did that mean...he’d stuck up for Yuya and the others? Where was he now??

“Where’s Reiji?” Yuya croaked, drawing backwards as Rin backed up, forcing them towards the other end of the hall.

“I’ve put him where you can’t touch him,” Leo said, eyes cold. “Ray and I will end this tonight.”

He aimed the gun and fired again. The bullet hit the wall beside them, but it was enough to cause Rin to flinch and lose her footing, sliding out of of the way as Leo lifted up for a second shot, this one aimed directly between Yuya’s eyes — 

The shot probably would have killed him, if the wall hadn’t exploded right then.

Yuya lost his grip on Reira when they were flung against the opposite wall, gagging at the pain that shot up his back from the impact. Dust shook from the ceiling, filling his lungs, and he choked on it, blinking back tears. He pawed blindly around for Reira — where had they gone? Were they okay? Where was Rin? What if the shot had hit her, instead?

Then Rin shrieked, and Yuya blinked the last of the dust from his eyes to look up at the nightmare that had arisen before him.

The gigantic creature, skin roiling with bubbles like faces trying to press out of its skin around the metal pounded into its flesh, leaned into the hallway, looking around lazily as though uncertain of where it was. Yuya’s heart pounded in his ears — no, wait. This was a different sound. It was the muffled pounding of hands against walls, following by muted, agonized screams. His head burned with the sound of it, cutting into his lungs as though he, too, wanted to scream.

He couldn’t take his eyes off of the creature. Off of the faces that seemed as though they were trying to actively crawl out of its skin, making it bubble and roil as though it were little more than jello shaped like a person. The pounding grew louder, the screaming  _ frantic _ though he could not hear the words, as though...as though thousands of voices were in incredible pain, begging for release.

A very peculiar feeling settled over him, like a spiderweb drifting from the ceiling and over his head. It started so softly, so distantly, that for a moment, he wasn’t sure if the feeling was his.

Then it roiled through him all at once, and he realized the feeling was anger.

Thoughts seemed to bubble through his head, thoughts that were and yet weren’t from inside him.

_ How dare they — how  _ dare _ they! How dare they how dare they how dare they —  _

White-hot anger, anger like he’d never felt before in his life, rocked through him. The pounding, the screaming — the faces. They were trapped. They’d been  _ shoved _ inside there, forcibly summoned and then stuffed into that prison as though they were nothing more than chattel — as though they were nothing more than leftovers! His throat burned with screams he did not release, his lungs were full of fire, he felt as though his eyes were burning, leaking the flaming rage that he didn’t know the meaning of — some small part of him registered that the things he was thinking made no sense.

How did he  _ know _ that the horrifying creature before him was a prison? How did he know that the echoing screams he heard were pleas for help, for release?

And why did it make him so angry?

He thought, perhaps, that the anger might simply eat him up from the inside like a fever, and then he would disappear, uncertain of what would be left in its wake.

Then his eyes fell on the limp thing clutched in the creature’s large hand, and in one breath, Yuya was Yuya again, the wind knocked out of him along with the rage that was and wasn’t his. His eyes bulged with panic.

“Reiji,” he gasped, his throat so tight that he couldn’t even squeeze out a shriek.

Reiji was — he was totally limp in the creature’s hand, his head lolled to the side — a trickle of blood leaked from his lips, one arm flopped against the monster’s knuckles. Oh god. Oh fuck. Was he — was he  _ dead _ ?

The monster swung its gaze slowly around the stunned frozen onlookers. Then its single eye focused back on its captive, and a terrible grin broke over its lips. It wrenched its arm back, and only moments before it happened, Yuya knew what it was going to do.

“Stop!!” he screamed, throwing himself forward. 

The motion caught the creature’s attention, but not in time to distract it from its mission of punching the hand with Reiji in it through the next wall. Yuya saw Reiji’s body lurch and flail — was he still alive?? Oh  _ god oh fuck _ — 

Yuya threw himself at the monster, ignoring the terrible feeling of the faces pressing for escape against his hands as he clawed at its skin.

“Down here!!” he yelled. “Down  _ here _ , you big ugly piece of — you put him  _ down — _ ”

A spray of bullets echoed over his head, ricocheting off of the monster’s metal plates, and Yuya had to duck his head down. Even now, was Leo trying to shoot him??

But no, he realized with a start as he was knocked backwards by the monster lazily turning around. His breath caught as he swung to see Leo, but Leo wasn’t looking at him. His eyes instead were fixed on the monster, hands shaking with rage as he fumbled another cartridge into his gun.

“You put him  _ down _ ,” Leo roared, firing another volley of bullets into the monster.

Most of them once again ricocheted off of the metal plating, but a few sunk into skin, striking against some of the faces that pressed to the surface — Yuya heard cries of pain echo in his head, causing his skin to shudder as though it too might begin to boil. His eyes filled up with tears as he slammed his hands over his ears. It didn’t do a thing to dampen the sound, though — if anything, it made the screaming  _ louder _ .

“Put him down,” Yuya gasped. “Put him  _ down _ !!”

He struggled to his feet, swaying.

“Let them go!” he screamed. “Let him — let all of them go! Let them go!”

He staggered forward, throwing himself at the creature’s waist — it barely seemed to notice him even as he clawed. He clawed at the faces that bubbled to the surface, as though he might be able to tear open the skin and release them, but he had about as much effect as a breeze trying to dislodge a mountain.

Bullets echoed once more uselessly over his head, and this time Yuya screamed as one of them cut against his arm, tearing open his sleeve and his skin in the same strike. He sagged against the creature, still clinging to it by his nails even as pain pulsed through his now bleeding arm. Tears blurred his eyes. This was all too — too much. It didn’t stop. There was nothing he could do. Nothing he could do for Reiji or for anyone at all.

Like a gasp of air, he felt something press into his hand a moment. Something like...like another hand, the same size as his, pressing through the skin of the monster against his.

_ Help us _ , the touch cried in the chorus of a thousand voice.  _ Please.  _

_ You came _

_ You came to _

_ You came to help _

_ Help us? _

Yuya couldn’t breathe. He tried to press back against the hand, the hand that was trying so desperately to grab onto his — but what could he do? He couldn’t even help himself, let alone Reiji, let alone the voices that were crying out to him, the ones he wasn’t even sure he was hearing. 

And yet...for just a moment, he felt as though he might....just be barely able to...grab hold....

“Put him  _ down _ !”

A new voice cut over everything, silencing the voices in Yuya’s head. A burst of energy exploded somewhere from behind him — he heard a brief scream, his own or the voices in the beast, he didn’t know. But then he was collapsing to the floor, still trying to dig his nails into the creature that had been there moments before, before the burst of energy had startled it.

Reiji fell to the floor in a heap, dropped unceremoniously. The monster no longer smiled as it staggered back. Instead its face was....afraid?

The face began to bubble even more, the faces pulling farther from the skin than before. The monster’s mouth opened wide in a silent scream. It took another ground shaking, staggering step back, away from...from... Yuya’s eyes swung around to what it stared at, the thing that scared it so much.

Reira stood, hands in fists on either side of them. Their eyes... _ glowed _ . White light poured from their eyes, their lips, as an aura that flickered rainbow at the tips of the white flames licked about their body, sending their lavender hair into a second, wavering aura behind them, almost like a pair of wings. They took a step forward, untrembling, towards the monster, and Yuya could only watch, his body pushing into the floor as though gravity had begun to sink around him, so heavy did his limbs feel.

Reira stepped forward again, forcing the creature back another step. They raised one hand, wreathed in white flames, towards the monster. 

It fled.

Faster than Yuya would have thought possible for a creature of its size, it turned back towards the holes it had made in the walls and loped away on all fours, disappearing into the darkness.

No sooner had it disappeared than the wreath of white flames around Reira’s body flickered out. The light dimmed in their eyes as they flickered, and they stumbled forward. Yuya found enough strength in his body to shove himself up, reaching for them as they collapsed, catching them before they hit the ground. Yuya nearly collapsed again under their weight, but managed to hold them up. 

It was only when he saw his tears sparkling against Reira’s hair that he realized he was crying. His shoulders shook, and a strange, hollow feeling overtook his chest. What...what was going  _ on _ with him?

Then he remembered Reiji. Trying to sit up and swing his head around, he looked desperately for some sign of where he had fallen. ...there!

Only feet away from him, Reiji laid on his side, crumpled on the floor like a doll tossed away. Yuya’s heart fluttered. Before he could move towards him, however, Rin appeared, stumbling towards him and dropping to her knees beside him. She fumbled for his pulse, wincing when she moved his arm a little too much, waiting for what felt far too long before her face relaxed, relief crashing over her.

“He’s alive,” she gasped. “He’s still alive!”

“Reiji!!”

Leo’s cracking voice broke the moment, and Rin tensed. She refused to move when Leo stumbled to his son’s side, collapsing next to him. His gun fell from his hands as he reached for Reiji — with more gentleness than Yuya could have imagined from this man, shifted Reiji up into his arms.

“Reiji,” Leo gasped. “Oh,  _ god _ , Reiji, what — how — please, goddammit, open your eyes —”

Reiji coughed. The sound seemed like it rattled his whole body, and he winced with pain, curling up on it. Despite the trickle of blood on his lip, he didn’t cough up anymore, which Yuya thanked any god that still existed for.

“Reiji!” Leo gasped again. “Reiji, please —”

Reiji’s eyes cracked open. For a moment, he looked very dizzy. Then his lips tightened into a thin line, and with perhaps a bit more strength than someone who looked like they should have almost died a moment ago, smacked his father with the back of his hand. Leo’s head snapped with surprised, though it didn’t have enough force to do much damage. His fingers gripped to Reiji a moment, but Reiji forced himself up to a sitting position past it.

“I’m not dead yet,” he said through grit teeth. “No thanks to you, father.”

“Reiji — Reiji, I didn’t —”

“Dude, you got punched through a  _ wall _ ,” Rin said, clearly ignoring the altercation. “How are you —”

“Resisting very little, and the fact that that  _ thing’s _ knuckles are so wide that they broke through the wall before I did,” Reiji said, though his face still contorted with pain, and he curled in on himself again, hugging his chest. “I may, however, have cracked more than one rib. Several ribs. Maybe some other bones as well.”

Leo sat there, frozen, his hands half raised, as though he wanted to reach for Reiji but wouldn’t allow himself too. Yuya couldn’t help but feel...sad for him. The lost, broken look on his face was heart-breaking, even though he’d been trying to kill Yuya a moment ago.

“Reiji, I only wanted...for you, and your sister, and for Reira...”

Reiji shot his father a cold, furious look, one that even made Yuya chill a bit.

“And for what?” he said, his voice tight and cold. “Yuya threw himself into danger for me when he could have simply fled. Do you still believe him a monster?”

Leo’s eyes flickered to Yuya for a moment, and Yuya tightened his arms on the half conscious Reira. He couldn’t read what was in those deep-set eyes, not this time. Reiji clutched his ribs with pain, but began to force himself to his feet anyway. Rin scrambled up — at first, she seemed like she was going to push him back down, but when he waved her off, she instead shifting to supporting him, pulling one of his arms over her shoulder.

“Reiji,” Leo whispered again, his voice cracked.

Reiji didn’t even look at him.

“I love Ray too, father,” he said. “But do you know what ‘love’ entails?”

Now, only now, did he flick his gaze back to his father, once again cold, and yet hotly angry all at once.

“Love means listening,” he said. “And it means telling someone when they are out of line.”

He turned his eyes back forward, determination screwing up his face. He glanced at Reira, and his angry expression finally faltered.

“Are...are they...?” he whispered.

Yuya shook his head.

“Whatever they did, I think it just tired them out,” he said.

Reiji nodded.

“And you?”

Yuya smiled shakily at him, lifting a tired thumb’s up.

“Still kicking.”

Reiji’s eyes softened, and a faint smile of relief graced his thin lips. He grunted as he shifted his weight against Rin, apologetically trying to lean off of her before she pulled him back.

“I need to find my sister,” he said.

Yuya tightened his arms around Reira.

_ Yeah _ , he thought.  _ I think... _

His eyes drifted towards the hole where the monster with the faces had disappeared, and he felt that cold, twisting feeling once again, the echo of the cries for help.

_ I think I need to find her, too. _

* * *

Yuzu woke up against the chest of a boy who was sobbing so much that there was a wet spot in her hair. She felt...hot. Hot  _ and _ cold, all over. Where...where was she? The last thing she remembered was that...that bathroom...and the reflection, growing and expanding...

She stirred, and the boy over her sniffled loudly.

“A-are you okay?” he said, his voice cracking so that the last word came out a lot like  _ “hoooh-ooo-k-k-aayyy?” _

Yuzu coughed, feeling like she had mucus in her throat. Ugh....

She tried to sit up, feeling dizzy. She ran her hand up to push her bangs back — and stopped when soemthing warm and sticky smudged onto her forehead from her palm.

She stared at her hand hanging in front of her, at the blood that stained her palms, in her nails. She looked down to find stains splattering her shirt and skirt, her legs. Immediately, her stomach lurched. It was all she could do to turn her head away from the boy in front of her before she emptied the meager contents of her stomach onto the stone.

“H-hey! Hey, it’s okay, it’s okay, you’re okay, you’re awake, you’re okay!”

The boy she didn’t know rubbed her back, a little too fast to be particularly soothing. She blinked back tears as she spat out the bile taste in her mouth, squeezing tears between her eyelashes as she did so.

“W-what’s happening?” she gasped. “What happened? W-where...”

Her eyes tilted towards their surroundings, and with a soft gasp, he grabbed hold of her, turning her head towards him. But she’d already seen the lumpy shadow, the body with the blood still leaking out of it onto the carved stones, and she threw up again, spitting up bile into his lap.

“Where  _ am _ I?” she sobbed, staring at her bloody hands. “What  _ happened _ ?”

A soft, thick sound, like a sob half swallowed, caught her attention. She didn’t let the boy hold her in place, struggling out of his shaking hands and turning towards it.

A stone alter stood at the very center of the stone circle, and bodies laid, leaking blood, all around it. Sitting on top of it, however was...Selena.

She had curled up on top of it, her knees to her chest, back to the rest of them, her face pressed into her thighs. Her ponytail had slipped entirely free of her ribbon, which laid on the ground slowly staining the yellow fabric red.

Selena. Selena. She was here. Yuzu’s mind raced. She staggered to her feet — despite the way the bodies and the blood made her stomach roil, she staggered towards her.

“Selena,” she croaked.

All of her convictions, her determination to confront Selena and ask her why she’d brought them here, why she’d betrayed them — they battled with a sudden concern for her, for the small girl curled into a ball on top of a sacrificial alter.

“Selena,” she said again, tears blurring her eyes. “What’s...what’s going  _ on? _ ”

Selena did not respond. She squeezed her legs tighter against her chest. Blood dripped from Yuzu’s fingers, still warm, still wet. She felt it on her face, in her hair, stained into her clothes, everywhere blood should not be. Bodies littered the ground like scattered stones, already frozen stiff with death.

And suddenly, she was angry. She was angry, and she was scared, and she didn’t know which of those feelings to have first.

She lunged for Selena, seizing her by the shoulders and pulling her around, forcing her to face her. Selena didn’t fight her, in spite of everything, letting herself be dragged around and shaken by Yuzu’s grip.

“Tell me what’s going on!” Yuzu cried, tears rolling down her face. “Why, Selena? Why would you — I thought we were friends!! Why would you bring us to a place like this — why am I covered in  _ blood _ ! Why — why are  _ you _ crying??”

Selena’s face was streaked with the same splattering of blood and tears as Yuzu’s own face, her body shaking in Yuzu’s grip. She reached, a moment for Yuzu’s wrists, and then dropped her hands, as though unable to touch her.

“I,” she gasped. “Yuzu, I...”

Her eyes flickered all over Yuzu, over the blood and her slipping pigtails, over the bodies, over Yuzu again, and her eyes bubbled with tears. She crushed her hands into her eyes, smearing more blood across her face.

Yuzu’s anger simply evaporated. She was suddenly tired. So tired, she could hardly stand. Her hands slipped from Selena’s shoulders.

“Please,” she begged, her voice cracking. “Tell me what’s happening?”

Selena did not drop her hands from her eyes. A gust of wind rustled the pine trees on all sides of them.

“I was brought here before I even knew how to talk,” Selena said, her voice cracking. “It was all I knew. Their laws. Their doctrines. I  _ believed _ them — I believed every word. Until — until the day they wanted me to participate in a demon summoning.”

She dropped her hands from her eyes, staring at her palms. Her hands shook.

“She was...she was only a child,” Selena said, her voice cracking. “They wanted me to — to kill her. I thought I could do it. I thought holding the knife would be easy. But she was so scared. I thought I was a believer, but when I saw her eyes looking at me with so much fear and plea, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t...s-so they did instead. I couldn’t stop them.”

She moaned, hugging herself around the face again.

“That was...that was when Ray came to me,” she said. “That’s when I heard her whispering to me, telling me what I could do, how I could...how I could escape. How I could  _ change _ things, so that no one else would have to die like that.”

Selena shook all over now, so hard that it seemed she would fall from her perch.

“I did it. I did everything she told me too — I let her live in my head, I let her show me everything she’d ever seen, the way she’d been killed — the place she had gone to, that horrible, horrible home of demons. I believed her, as much as I’d believed the cult before that. She was my  _ savior _ .”

Selena slumped, and this time she did slide off of the altar, curling up in a ball at the foot of it. Yuzu hardly knew how to breathe. She didn’t...understand. Who was Ray? Who was...

And yet, somehow, she knew. She felt it, beneath her skin, the echo of something that had been there before. Not something — someone.  _ Her _ . A girl...a girl like them. Someone who had been killed on this altar once before, to summon a demon that never came.

“They thought I was still one of them. We used that. They were going to use me to lure in the sacrifices, and the vessels. Ray wanted everyone in one place — the cult, and the vessels, so she could take her revenge on them. So  _ we _ could take their revenge on them.”

Selena burrowed her head deeper into her arms.

“But I...I liked you,” Selena mumbled.

Yuzu stirred. A faint, croaking laugh escaped her lips, remembering how she’d thought Selena’s ‘confession’, something that felt like it had been years ago, had been her coming out to her.

“You  _ liked _ me?” Yuzu said. “Why did you...bring us here then...?”

“I liked  _ all  _ of you!” Selena said, lifting her head so quickly that tears flung from her eyes in the motion. “You, and Yuya — and Ruri and Yuto and Shun — I liked how it felt with you, how  _ pretending _ to be someone for all of you started to feel real, started to feel as though it was what I  _ wanted _ before I had ever wanted anything for myself ever before —”

She choked on her words, and pressed her hand to her mouth.

“But Ray,” she whispered. “She told me that it was all a lie. That they...Yuya, and Yuto, and the others...they were lies. Carefully crafted lies by the demon who wanted to kill me, and you, and everyone. I believed her. I didn’t know how else to think without someone else to do it for me.”

Her eyes lifted up then, looking past Yuzu, and Yuzu turned, lips parting, towards where she stared. The boy...the one she’d woken up leaning against. He...she sucked in a breath. He had a face like Yuya’s, although it was...rounder, perhaps, a little more open. In his arms, he carefully supported the body of a second boy, his eyes fluttering — him, too, with a face like Yuya’s.

“But then he...I heard you talking about Rin,” Selena said. “I don’t know. How can you lie so well?”

“I’m not lying!” the boy said insistently. “I don’t know — if I’m some demon or anything!! But Rin — Rin is — I would never lie about loving Rin!!”

At that, his face immediately flushed, and he shut his mouth tight. The boy he supported let out a painful sounding, sarcastic laugh that made him wince.

“Gods, can you be any more annoying,” he mumbled.

Yuzu’s hands tightened against each other, even against the slipperiness of the blood.

“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” Selena whispered. “I don’t...I didn’t want to see you like me, Yuzu.”

She looked down at her bloody hands, and Yuzu felt, in spite of her desire to be angry, a squeeze of her heart, and tears filling her eyes. Selena looked  _ broken _ . Yuzu  _ felt _ broken by just a single night here. What would a lifetime do?

Yuzu stared at the blood on her hands again, at the bodies around them. The cult, it looked like. Her hands tightened into fists before her. Well. No losses there, then.

She stepped forward, and crouched in front of Selena. Despite her bloody hand, she reached for Selena’s cheek, cupping it gently towards her. Selena’s tear glazed eyes avoided hers, but Yuzu didn’t try to force it.

“I am not going to tell you what to do, or what to believe,” she said. “But I still only know half of what’s happening. And there’s no way I’m letting any innocent person die tonight.”

Selena’s eyes finally slid to hers. Her lips parted. Then she dropped her eyes to the ground again.

“There’s nothing we can do,” she said dully. “Ray’s made up her mind. She can’t...we can’t stop her.”

Yuzu tightened her jaw. She hadn’t met this  _ Ray _ yet, but when she did, she was going to give her a piece of her mind. She stood up straight, folding her arms.

“I don’t believe that for a second,” she said. “No one is unstoppable.”

“The only thing that might be able to actually go up against her is another demon,” said Selena, shaking her head. “And we don’t have...we don’t have one of those.”

Yuzu tightened her hands into her arms, fresh anger roiling through her — this time, for the goddamn world and this goddamn night.

“Well, I’m not giving up!” she said. “And Selena — you know what, I don’t know what to believe about  _ you _ right now, either!”

Selena’s eyes flickered up to her, lips parting. Yuzu leaned down so that their faces were inches apart.

“But I’m not giving up on you, either,” she said. “Or anything.”

Selena’s eyes widened slightly. Her lips opened.

Then the boy let out a little gasp.

“RIN!!” he cried.

Yuzu stood up straight, whipping around. Her heart hammered in her chest — and then, all at once, she relaxed. Fresh tears, relief this time, flooded to her eyes. She forgot momentarily about the blood and the bodies, and almost melted right then and there.

Yuya, haggard and exhausted, but still faintly smiling with relief, led the small group out of the motel, and stumbling slowly towards the summing circle. Yuzu’s knees shook and she let out a breath that had been caught somewhere beneath her lungs.

“Oh thank  _ god _ ,” she mumbled.


	20. Chapter 20

Yuya scrambled across the distance between him and Yuzu, and Yuzu started forward, too, before she noticed the blood on her hands again and stepped back, wringing her bloody palms with vibrating nerves. Yuya had a child no older than ten in his arms, but that didn’t stop him from careening towards Yuzu. He nearly slipped in all the blood, then hopped over it and hurried over the last few feet to her.

“Are you okay??” he blurted, eyes wide with fear. “Are you hurt? Did they hurt you?”

He carefully set the child down, leaning them against one of the stone pillars away from the blood and bodies, then whirled towards her again. She couldn’t even step back again before he’d thrown his arms around her, seemingly uncaring of the blood that covered her.

The second she was in his hug, she melted. Everything about the night crashed down on her, and she dropped her head against his shoulder, digging her fingers into the back of his shirt as she began to cry. He hugged her so tightly that it compressed her lungs, but she didn’t care. He was okay! He was here and he was okay.

“I’m sorry!” Yuya gasped. “Yuzu, I’m so  _ sorry _ ...”

“W-what are you apologizing for?” she mumbled, squeezing tighter into him.

“I-if I hadn’t been dumb and tried to run all the way back to my dorm, if I’d just stayed with you —”

“It’s not your fault,” she said firmly, her eyes prickling with tears. “They would have found a way one way or another.”

Yuya finally broke out of the hug and held her at arm’s length, looking her over, pale and drawn.

“Are you hurt? Did anyone hurt you?”

“N-no,” Yuzu said. “None...none of this is mine.”

She felt cold suddenly, wondering what Yuya might interpret that as meaning, but Yuya only looked relieved. He hugged her again, squeezing her so tight that she felt like it might squeeze all of the awful night out of her.

Behind them, she heard a brief squeak as another reunion took place. The boy who must be Rin’s Yugo yelped as Rin launched herself at him, scooping him up off the ground.

“You dumbass!!” she said between choked tears. “You big dummy, Yugo!!! You’re hurt!”

“R-Riiiin,” Yugo wailed, clinging to her and seemingly incapable of vocalizing any sound other than her name over and over again.

Yuzu finally extracted herself from Yuya’s grip, heart slowing now — but still, she knew they weren’t out of the woods yet. She clung to Yuya’s hand, eyes widening as she saw the limping Reiji coming to rest by the pillar near the child.

“R-Reiji?” she gasped. “What are  _ you _ doing here?”

“It is a long story,” Reiji said wryly. 

“After you were kidnapped, I met the big brother of one of the other kidnapped girls, he rescued me,” said Yuya. “Then Reiji — Reiji’s sister, Ray, she was the last sacrifice, he was researching this cult — we made a plan, he gave me a tracker and I let myself get kidnapped and they followed us here —”

Yuzu’s eyes filled with tears all over again, and she halfheartedly smacked his shoulder.

“You idiot!!” she said. “How could you put yourself in danger like that, when you’d already gotten away!”

Yuya’s big red eyes filled with tears again too.

“I couldn’t just leave you out here!” he said. “I had to find you!”

“Idiot,” Yuzu mumbled again, but she was shaking, now, crying now because of how hard Yuya had worked to get to her. It made her feel much safer, somehow.

Reiji knelt down next to the child, wincing painfully and pressing a hand to his ribs. How had he gotten hurt? Yuzu stepped towards them, still clinging to Yuya’s hand.

“Are you okay?” she said. “And...and how about them?”

Reiji felt at the child’s head.

“Reira overextended themselves,” he said. “I...I don’t know what sort of power they used.”

He frowned, then his eyes lifted up to the rest of the scene, and he frowned.

“Ah,” he said. “You must be Selena.”

Selena flinched as Yuzu turned back towards them, but then she straightened her shoulders and stood very still, her face screwed up despite the tear tracks still running down her smeared face.

“And you’re Ray’s siblings,” she said.

“You’re the one who brought us all here,” said Reiji. It was not a question, but Selena nodded.

“Ray wanted her family to be here. She asked me to bring you.”

Her determined face slipped, and she dropped her gaze to the ground.

“I think she wanted to see you one last time, after she finished everything,” she said, her voice cracking.

Reiji’s eyes were level, unreadable as he considered her. Then he groaned, shifting back to his feet. Yuya leaned towards him, concern creasing his face.

“Reiji, you need to rest,” he said.

“There are other injured,” said Reiji. “We need to check on their status.”

His eyes were on the other boy, the one Yugo had been tending. Yuzu wasn’t sure who it was — could it be Ruri’s Yuto? Or someone else? Yuya let go of Yuzu’s hand and pushed Reiji gently back down, moving to the other boy himself.

The boy didn’t move as Yuya looked over him, and Yugo squirmed out of Rin’s hug to lean over.

“He’s hurt real bad,” said Yugo, wringing his hands. “H-he got shot. I gave him something that was supposed to help but he’s still zoning out.”

“He still has a pulse,” said Yuya, more to himself than to Yugo. “Hey. Hey, Yuuri. Open your eyes — you can’t go to sleep yet.”

A coughing, sarcastic laugh, more air than sound, escaped Yuuri’s lungs.

“I’m  _ dying _ , Yuya, not napping,” he said, a sardonic smile stretching painfully at his lips. “I believe the shot struck lower than I thought previously.”

He grunted with pain when Yuya tried to prop him up, and Yuya didn’t touch him again. His face was pale as he looked up.

“We need to get everyone to a hospital,” he said. “Does anyone have a phone? Anything?”

“They won’t work,” Selena said flatly, and all eyes were on her again. Her eyes fixed on the ground without meeting any other gaze. “Ray’s created a closed space. As far as she’s concerned, nothing outside of this area exists. As long as we’re within her sights, she won’t let anything come in, or anything leave.”

“Then we have to stop her!” Yugo said, fists raised. “Somehow, we have to stop her, and get out of here!”

Selena shook her head again.

“Everything has been set up for her,” she said. “The tunnels feed her energy directly from the other side, and her rage is enough to keep her going for decades. Nothing short of a demon the same strength as her could stop her.”

Yuya’s fists clenched at his sides, and Yuzu’s gaze flickered to him, her lips parting. When he stood, everyone look at him now.

“No,” Rin said, eyes flashing. “No, Yuya, we talked about this!”

“We don’t have any other choices,” he said. “We can’t leave until that portal is closed, and Ray is gone, and she’s not controlling reality anymore. The only way to stop her is to summon Zarc.”

Silence met his words. Wind gusted through the pines again, sounding like the whispers of a thousand voices. Yuzu thought that even her heart stopped for a moment.

Then Yugo made a choked sound, quickly pushing Rin behind him.

“No way!!” Yugo said. “You have to kill Rin and the others for that, don’t you?? No way!!”

“I don’t think it needs to be a  _ sacrifice _ . The ritual we read in the basement just said there needed to be  _ blood _ ,” Yuya said. “We don’t have any other options! Ray can’t be reasoned with!”

“Yuya,” said Yuzu, her brow furrowing and her hands clasping against her chest. “But...that means...one of you has to get  _ possessed _ . What if the demon doesn’t give you  _ back _ ?”

Yuya met her eyes, and Yuzu held them fiercely, searching for the sign that this was still the Yuya she knew, that she’d grown up with. The boy she’d trust with her life. 

“I know...I know it sounds crazy,” said Yuya, his voice lowering. “But...I can’t explain it, but it feels like...it feels like everything will be okay.”

He frowned, as though he were remembering some distant memory, something he could hardly catch.

“It feels like it’s the only right thing to do.”

This time, it was Selena’s turn to let out a choked laugh.

“Ray was right,” she said, taking a step back from all of them. “You are demons — the demon part of you is  _ convincing _ you this. It’s manipulating you.”

“It’s not!” Yuya said, though his face paled, and it was obvious that the thought had occurred to him. “Please. We can’t make things worse than they already are!”

“We could doom the world to destruction instead of just ourselves,” mumbled Selena.

“Or maybe there’s more to everything than it seems!” said Yuya. “If you can tell me, one hundred percent, Selena, that I and the other guys have to die in order to save the world — if you can be one hundred percent sure of that — then tell me, and I’ll stand here and wait for Ray to come and kill me.”

“No!” Yuzu said, the sound ripping out of her almost involuntarily. She leaped towards him, grabbing his hand and whirling towards Selena, eyes wide.

Selena stared at the two of them. Her brows furrowed, and her lips parted. She slowly shook her head.

“I can’t,” she said, so quietly Yuzu could barely hear her. “I...can’t tell you anything and be sure of it anymore.”

“Then what do we have to lose?” said Yuya.

_ Everything _ , Yuzu thought but didn’t say, her eyes sparking with tears as she clung to his hand.

“You guys are  _ all _ crazy! On all sides of it!” said Rin. “What about all of the stuff that needs to be right to summon this guy, huh? The moon, and the timing, and the tunnels? None of that is right!”

Selena bit her lip, and Yuzu saw something flicker in her eyes. Reiji must have noticed it too, because his eyes leveled to her, narrowing.

“There’s a way, isn’t there,” he said softly.

Selena’s eyes widened. She stepped back. Her eyes flicked from one staring set of eyes to the next. Then they dropped to the ground again, fists shaking at her black-robed sides.

“There...is,” she said, slowly.

She licked her lips, an agonizing second passing before she spoke again.

“Ray believes that...since she couldn’t find Zarc in hell, that Zarc put most of himself in humans, hiding himself in pieces in human souls,” said Selena. “The majority of him — his power — still remains in hell, like a cloud...but  _ he _ himself is here.”

Her eyes lifted up to Yuya and the others.

“If... _ if _ we had all four of each of us,” she said slowly. “Then us, the ones whose voices can cross the veil, could call the pieces of Zarc out of you all, call the last of him from hell, and put them all back together.”

“But then...what about all this stupid ritual, if that’s all it takes?” said Rin.

“Because the method they  _ chose _ is the one that lets you  _ control _ a demon,” said Selena, shaking her head. “Blood sacrifice, channeled moon positions, ritual designs with baked in contracts — it’s how you summon a demon that’s bound to you, and forced to obey your commands.”

She bit her lip.

“ _ This _ way is the way to call a demon to the physical realm as themselves. We’d have no control over him. He’d be able to do as he wishes, just like any of us.”

“Then maybe we can explain to him what’s happening, and he’ll help,” said Yuya.

Selena’s lips cracked into an actual smile, a sort of crazed look.

“You think he’ll  _ help _ ? That the demon of the  _ apocalypse _ will have a soft side?”

“I think he’s the only one we have left to turn to,” said Yuya. “Listen, I can’t explain why! Maybe he  _ is _ manipulating me! But...but I feel like...like this is  _ right _ .”

His hand tightened on Yuzu’s, and Yuzu looked up at him. He had that look in his eyes — the kind of look he got when he saw some horrible injustice, and he knew he had to charge forward and fix it. There was nothing...off about him. He was just him. If he was being manipulated by some secret demon genes, it was even subtler than she could see.

She turned back to Selena.

“Let’s...try it,” she whispered.

Selena’s eyes widened, but Yuzu continued.

“I believe in Yuya. I think we should try it.”

Selena ran a hand through her mussed, matted hair, smearing more blood into it.

“I agree,” Reiji said, startling all of them. He held Reira gently against him, looking down at them. “I don’t know that I can express it either, but something...something tells me that this must be our only option.”

He glanced up, the faint light of the frozen moon glinting in his eyeglasses.

“Perhaps being able to see her great enemy and fight against him will soothe my sister’s spirit,” he said. “Perhaps it will give her closure.”

He shrugged then.

“And perhaps if he is the monster you believe him to be, she will simply defeat him, and it will be over. There will be no need to kill the vessels if he’s been removed from them.”

Selena frowned, shifting back her weight and folding her arms, as though that angle had just occurred to her. Then her eyes widened and she shook her head wildly.

“You’re all insane!” she said. “And besides — we don’t have all of the pieces! Ruri and Yuto are still unaccounted for, and Ray is likely possessing Ruri right now — she isn’t likely to sit back and let us summon him!”

“I won’t let her have a choice.”

The voice was even, almost serene, and it made everyone flinch. All eyes swung to the other end of the summoning circle where the exit to the motel resided, at the trio that slowly made their way out towards them.

The man who must be Ruri’s brother, Kurosaki, held the boy who must be Yuto in his arms, staggering along. Yuto looked conscious, but only barely. Ruri on the other hand...she walked stiffly, her face strangely frozen and flat of expression. It took them a decent amount of time to get all the way over to them, and when Ruri stopped close enough to see, her eyes were clear. Selena swore softly.

“How are you...” she whispered.

Ruri’s face did not move.

“She says she needs a lot of concentration,” said Kurosaki, gasping as he let Yuto to the ground, and himself with him. “She’s...she’s got that feral thing locked up in her head.”

“I don’t know how much longer I can keep her there,” Ruri said, her voice even and monotone. “We already heard most of what you said. I think I agree. We should try it.”

Selena swore again, staring at Ruri with huge eyes. Ruri’s perfect composure faltered just a moment, her legs twitching and eyes fluttering.

“She can’t hear us right now,” said Ruri. “I buried her very deep. But she is digging herself out. We don’t have much time.”

Selena stared at her for a long, long moment. Then she shook her head.

“You’re all insane,” she said again, but there was some measure of awe in her voice this time. She snapped around towards the rest of them, hands tight at her sides like a soldier taking an attentive stance. “Fine. Fine! We’ll do this the crazy way. But —”

She swung her finger from Yuya, to Yuto, to Yugo, and then to Yuuri.

“One of you has to be the host,” she said. “And I have no idea what happens to a host after a demon leaves it. They never experimented with that — every demon they summoned as practice, they just put into the Repository.”

Yuzu shivered, uncertain of what that was, but freezing up at the idea of so many demons they had “practiced” summoning. But her blood chilled to think of anyone taking that sacrifice — of letting this potential monster into them. Yuya leaned forward against her grip, his mouth opening, and she  _ knew _ he was about to volunteer himself.

Yuuri let out a thin, coughing laugh again, startling the words from Yuya before he could speak.

“I should think it’s obvious, my dear,” Yuuri said. “After all, I’m already dying anyway.”

* * *

They moved Yuuri, carefully, but still with some small winces of pain from him, onto the altar. Yuya hated seeing anyone on that thing, knowing what it was meant to be used for, but Selena said it was the best place to take advantage of the girls’ power. Selena moved most of the bodies out of the way, shoving them off the side of the stone dais, seemingly unbothered by touching them — or maybe she was beyond caring. There was nothing they could do about the blood, but Selena said that it would probably only help — demons were drawn to the scent.

Yuya shivered, and wondered one last time if they were doing the right thing. This was  _ his _ plan. If it went wrong...it was all on him.

Kurosaki looked upset about this turn of events, but also incapable of arguing with his sister in her state. He helped move Yuto against one of the pillars, then Yuya and Yugo stood at the ones on either side of him, forming a triangle at the top of the circle, facing Yuuri. Reiji, Reira, and Kurosaki had to leave the circle, standing tensely outside of it.

Then Selena had the girls stand on all sides of the altar, joining their hands together.

“I am going to say some words, and you have to repeat them,” Selena said. “Don’t  _ think _ about them, or worry about pronouncing them. When you hear them, you will understand them as long as you don’t overthink it.”

“This is too weird,” Rin complained. “What does that  _ mean _ ?”

“We just have to do it,” said Yuzu, and Yuya watched her back tense as she tightened her grip on the girls on either side of her.

“I’m going to say an old invitational prayer,” Selena continued, as though she hadn’t been interrupted. “Then I’m going to call his name. We’ll have to keep repeating it until he shows up —  _ if _ he shows up.”

“Hurry,” Ruri said, barely moving her lips. “She’s starting to come closer to the surface. She’ll figure out what we’re doing soon.”

Selena tightened up, and Yuya closed his eyes.

He still wasn’t ready when he heard the first word drop from Selena’s lips.

The same awful ringing cut through him, sending him to his knees. His body  _ shook _ , his mouth dried. It was as though something rattled him from the inside. 

It wasn’t even close to the pain that rocked him when all four girls spoke the words together.

He might have screamed, or maybe that was just his brain. He was  _ ripping _ apart! Something inside him was tearing, some hand reaching inside of him and yanking at his insides, tearing him apart from the inside. He collapsed to the ground, but barely felt the stones for the prickling, impossible pain that overtook every inch of his skin. He forced himself to stay as still as he could, though the pain made him want to roll and convulse — Selena told them they needed to stay near the pillars, so that the pieces of the demon inside them would be guided along it — 

He rolled onto his back, anyway, curling in on himself with his hands crunched over his head as the words kept  _ coming _ , kept digging and clawing at his insides — 

For a moment, he saw the skin of his chest bulge — almost like the bubbles of frothing faces trying to escape the monster. The bulge pushed from his chest, as though threatening to explode, to burst him open in a rain of blood.

Then it  _ shifted _ beneath his skin, pulling up, getting into his throat so that he felt as though he’d swallowed a slimy frog that was not crawling back up it. It felt like agonizing ages before the bubble finally, finally, broke through his mouth — and a cloud of black smoke poured out of him.

As soon as the pain had begun, it was gone. His body was...empty. Empty and light and completely...unharmed. He blinked, startled at how almost  _ refreshed _ he felt. It was as though he’d never felt pain at all. Not even a ghost of it remained.

He no longer heard the words, though when he pushed himself onto his hands and knees, he could see the girls’ lips still moving. Black smoke coiled above them, swirling like the eye of a tornado. In fact, the cloud began to bubble and twist, a funnel cloud feeding down. Between the links of the girls’ arms, Yuya saw the smoke feeding into Yuuri’s mouth, open wide in a silent scream. His heart panged with panic. Was he still in pain? Yuya should have been the one up there — this had been his plan!

Yuuri’s body convulsed — once — twice — three times.

Then the smoke finished feeding into him, and his mouth and eyes snapped shut, his body falling limp. His head lolled to the side. His...his chest stopped rising and falling.

Almost as one, all four girls collapsed to their knees, still clinging together despite their shaking. Yuya stared. Had...had it worked? Or was Yuuri...

Yuuri’s eyes snapped open. They were not black, like the girls’ had been, nor were they still the magenta of before. As he sat up, letting his glasses slide from his nose and fall to the ground, his irises were a brilliant, shining gold.

Those eyes cut around the circle, glancing past the heads of the girls who had fallen behind the altar on all sides of him, just out of his immediate view. His...his face was still Yuuri’s, despite the eyes...but the movements were quick, sharp — much faster than the injured Yuuri ought to move, and with a animalistic fierceness.

When those golden eyes caught against the first person they saw — Yuya — he saw the pupils contract into slits.

Fast, much faster than Yuuri. The body that had once been Yuuri’s leaped into a crouch, and launched off of the altar. Yuya’s eyes widened, and he scrambled back, running into the pillar behind him, but he was no match for the speed of the creature. It landed in front of Yuya with a spray of rock dust and pebbles, and then its hands were in Yuya’s collar, lifting him up and slamming him against the pillar.

“Where  _ are _ they?” 

The voice, like Ray’s had been, was like a second voice had layered atop of Yuuri’s, this one deeper and harsher, and yet...more human than Yuya had expected. Yuya gasped as he was shoved hard against the pillar, head spinning. 

He didn’t know what he had been expecting, but this was not it.

“You absolute  _ dumbasses _ , not even putting a single contract bond on me? Did you think yourselves so damn  _ powerful _ that you could control me just like that? After what you bastards did? Well, you’re —”

The voice petered off as the pupils suddenly began to expand back to their normal size again. His mouth hung open as he stared at Yuya. Then, almost unceremoniously, he dropped Yuya, letting him collapse back down to the pillar, coughing.

“You’re...just a kid,” said Zarc — because who else could it be? “What the hell? Did you think summoning a demon was a fun summer camp activity or something?? Because it’s not! It’s actually very annoying!”

Yeah, whatever Yuya had been imagining, it was  _ not _ this. Not this at all. Why did he sound like a concerned parent??

“Hang on. Hang on. Shit. I have been asleep for a  _ long ass time _ .”

Zarc smacked himself on the side of the head a few times — on the side of Yuuri’s head — and then shook himself out, mussing Yuuri’s already mussed hair. He frowned as he ran his hands through Yuuri’s hair, then poked at the bloody spot around his chest.

“Oh, that’s not good. That doesn’t go there.”

He made a face like he was trying to go to the bathroom  _ really badly _ , and then a bullet popped out of his skin, clattering to the ground. He patted the suddenly smooth, untouched skin.

“ _ That’s _ better. Whew! Okay. Where the fuck am I.”

The others were all finally coming to their senses, perhaps as shell-shocked by Zarc’s appearance as Yuya had been. Selena was the first to speak.

“ _ You’re _ Zarc?” she said, her voice cracking with shock.

Zarc blinked. He stared at her. Then he looked at Yuya again. Then at Yugo, and Yuto, who both stared at him open-mouthed. Then at Reiji, Reira, and Kurosaki, who had each stepped back up onto the summoning circle. He looked down at the circle, and stomped his foot onto it, then up at the sky and the moon, mouth hanging open.

“Yeahhh, that would be me,” said Zarc. “So should I assume I’m here on purpose, or by accident?”


	21. Chapter 21

Selena seemed to be the most shaken by Zarc’s unexpected appearance. She actually had to sit down on the ground with her head in her hands, while Zarc looked around through Yuuri’s eyes with a growing confusion on his face. Yuya sat there where he’d fallen, staring up at him with his mouth hanging open.

In the end, Reiji was the first to speak. He stepped up onto the lip of the summoning circle, wincing as his ribs and legs protested. He shouldn’t be standing — he _ should _ be staying still so he wouldn’t irritate his already cracked and broken bones. But he didn’t have the time for such luxuries.

His movement caught Zarc’s attention, and for a moment, Reiji almost froze. But there was nothing of the malice or cruelty that he would expect out of a creature that demanded the sacrifice of his sister — nothing more than a quite sincere confusion. And if there was anything else that confirmed Reiji’s beginning suspicions that this “Zarc” wasn’t as dangerous as they had assumed...Reira still held to his hand, and made no move to pull him away. Instead, they only watched Zarc with a frowning curiosity, not even a hint of the fear they had seemed to feel for Ray’s new state.

“Are you Zarc?” Reiji said.

Zarc frowned at him, the look of puzzlement somehow seeming strange to Yuuri’s face, as though Yuuri had never been puzzled about anything in his life.

“Are you in charge?” Zarc said, in the strange, double voice that was one of the only signs that he was not of this world.

Reiji almost laughed, but the pain of expelling air from his lungs nipped that in the bud.

“I lost what little control I had in this situation a very long time ago,” he said. “I don’t believe you were what we were expecting.”

“I get that a lot.”

Zarc looked around the summoning circle, at all of the people staring at him. He glanced at the pillars, and then kicked at the carved runes all over the floor.

“So, uh,” said Zarc. “I kinda thought when I woke up next, I was gonna be surrounded by a bunch of cultists. Not a bunch of kids. Did you guys put all this together? Because it’s a _ mess _. Like man. Look at all these contract loopholes.”

He kicked at the carved runes again, shaking his head at them.

“Who taught y’all how to summon? Like shit. If you’d summoned me with this circle instead of — whatever it is you did — I could have broken contract in like, two seconds.”

“These were — ancient runes,” said Selena, staring at him with her mouth hanging open. “They — we — they spent _ years _ tracking down and recreating this precisely.”

“Well, you guys did a _ shit _ job. Look at this! You don’t even write my name right in this part. Like, who the fuck is _ Zorc? _”

Zarc shook his head, looking for all the world like a teenager judging a child’s poor crayon drawing. Reiji wasn’t sure his heart could take many more surprises.

“A self-respecting demon would be _ embarrassed _ to get summoned by this.”

“Well, _ you _came,” said Yugo, petulantly, despite the sharp, wide-eyed look Rin gave him.

“Yeah, because you guys did the spiritual equivalent of slamming a bunch of pots and pans around outside my window at four in the morning. Hard to _ not _ wake up to that.”

Reiji had truly thought he’d already lost control of the situation, and yet somehow found even more threads slipping away from him. He tightened his grip on Reira’s hand and tried to catch Zarc’s attention again.

“You knew you’d be summoned here,” he said. “Is that correct?”

“Eventually, yeah,” said Zarc, rubbing at his nose. “Someone was trying to drag me out here a while back, but something fucked up and I fell back out on the other side. Nosed around a bit, heard about this cult, figured they were probably gonna try again. They always do.”

Reiji’s heart tightened. Ray.

“Why?” he said, his voice cracking. “Why did you — why did you want to be summoned?”

Zarc blinked at him. Then he narrowed his eyes, tilting his head.

“Okay, let’s get one thing straight,” he said, holding up one finger. “Like almost no demon ever _ wants _ to be summoned. How would you like it if a bunch of mice suddenly magically yanked you out of your bed at two am and told you to...I don’t fucking know, give them a bunch of cheese or something?”

He threw his hands up in the air.

“It’s not _ my _ fault you humans came up with ways to bother us.”

“But — the old rituals say _ you _ were the one to pass this on to humans, so that you could be resurrected and...destroy the world,” Selena said.

Zarc _ actually _ laughed at that, a short, surprised bark.

“Kid, listen — just cause a bunch of humans said it was true, doesn’t mean it was. I mean, look at religion.”

He waved a hand through the air vaguely at nothing, though he chuckled again, as though pleased with his own joke.

“But _ you _ were the one to hide yourself in humans!” Selena insisted, staggering to her shaking feet. “ _ You _were the one who wasn’t in hell when she...when she...”

She swayed, looking suddenly exhausted, and Yuzu sprang to her feet to catch her. Zarc frowned. He glanced at Reiji again.

“Okay, okay,” he said, running his hands through his hair. “Now, I don’t have a contract with any of you, so I don’t _ have _ to tell you anything. But number one: hell isn’t _ real _, or if it is, I haven’t seen it yet. The place I come from isn’t any wilder than here, though it’s got a lot weirder flowers.”

He held up both hands.

“And why would I wanna destroy your world? Like, I’m not gonna say I _ couldn’t _ . Even one of you could, if you really wanted — you already do, all the time. But if I _ did _ , _ my _world would go boom! Gone. Our world relies on yours, unfortunately.”

He clapped his hands at the word ‘boom’, making Reira jump with a squeak.

“But what about the part where pieces of you were in human souls?” Reiji said, nodding towards the boys. “You set up for this. You were _ waiting _ for someone to summon you — not simply existing on the other side.”

Zarc’s eyes lost their mirth. He let his hands fall back to his sides, swinging slightly.

“Okay, yeah, you got me there,” said Zarc. “Here the thing. I _ can’t _ come here any time I want to. I can peek sometimes, at the right moments and places, look out and see what’s going on. But I can’t cross the barrier, not without help, or a little trickery.”

“Then why did you go to such lengths?”

“Because this damn cult started kidnapping my friends!” 

Zarc’s eyes _ flashed _, actually glowing a moment as his pupils contracted, and when his lips drew back, Yuuri’s teeth had lengthened slightly into fangs.

“Every day, another demon disappeared! Another one got yanked over to your mess of a world and never came back!”

Yuya sucked in a sharp, ragged breath. Reiji already knew exactly where his mind was going — Reiji’s mind shot to that creature, the monster with the faces trying to escape its flesh.

“I told you, I can’t get over here without being summoned, and the cult was taking its sweet little time trying for me again! I had to find a way to get here and find my friends and take them _ back _.”

He ground his knuckles into his forehead, growling a low, reverberating sound that sent some primal sense in Reiji on fire. Everyone could only stare at him. He sounded...remarkably _ human _, Reiji thought. It was almost more frightening than the monster he’d thought they were going to face.

Yuya’s eyes shot to Reiji, wide and frightened.

“That monster,” he breathed, and Reiji’s ribs twinged with the ghostly remembrance of that monster’s hands squeezing him. “Reiji, it has to be that thing, right? That must be where the demons are! I could hear them calling out for help!”

“You’ve seen them?” Zarc said, whirling towards him, eyes wide. “Where are they?? I need to get my hands on the _ bastards _ that took them —”

“You might have been beaten out for that,” Reiji said, and as though in response, Ruri let out a long, low moan.

The atmosphere instantly snapped from almost comical back to the intense anxiety of before. Kurosaki swore, leaping over the lip of the dais and running over to where Ruri had slumped onto the ground. Zarc frowned, his eyes following them. Immediately, his pupils contracted again, and he drew back, shoulders hunching. Reira’s hand suddenly crunched into Reiji’s and he felt his sibling begin to tremble once again.

“Hang on,” Zarc said, eyes fixed on Ruri — though, somehow, Reiji felt as though he wasn’t looking at _ Ruri _ . “Who is _ that _?”

“She knows!” Ruri gasped, her eyes wide. “She knows, she knows what we did, she knows, she’s breaking back out —”

Her voice strangled in midsentence — and her eyes bled to black.

A horrible shriek twisted Ruri’s throat, her body convulsing in ways it shouldn’t move. Kurosaki was flung back into a puddle of blood, and Zarc let out a hiss that might have been actually been fear.

Ruri swayed to her feet. It was more like strings had yanked her up, like a puppet, and she actually hovered, several centimeters from the ground. Her hair whipped around her as though she had her own personal galestorm, and the trees began to groan as the wind picked up.

Her black eyes seemed to open up with a second layer of eyelids, revealing an endless storm of fire inside.

“Oh, shit,” said Zarc.

Ruri — no, Ray, opened her stolen mouth and screamed. It was all Reiji could do to push Reira behind him before she streaked forward faster than the eye could see.

Heat billowed over him in the wake of her movement, sending him backwards to his knees with a wash of fresh pain. Reira clung to his shoulders, half holding him up, half holding themself up. Reiji’s eyes watered from the hot steaming air that suddenly stained every breath. This was beyond anything that Ray had shown so far — she had snapped further than he’d thought possible.

When his vision finally cleared enough to see, he tried to make sense of what had happened. A huge, melted scorch of rock had scarred down the middle of the summoning circle, and parts of the stone were actually still _ actively _ flaming. Two of the pillars had collapsed, outwards, luckily, so that they didn’t strike either of the boys near them — Yuto, still sitting and shuddering, had his hands over his head and eyes squeezed shut, and Yugo was running for where Rin had begun to lift herself up at the altar.

As for Ray and Zarc...

Zarc, somehow, had managed to avoid Ray’s first charge. The tips of Yuuri’s hair looked a tad singed, but he stumbled to his feet, hands raised. Darkness began to swirl around his palms as Ray recorrected her course, stumbling forwards in Ruri’s body, seemingly in shock that she had missed.

“You _ coward _ ,” she said, her voice vibrating so harshly that Ruri’s natural voice was completely lost beneath it. “You won’t _ fight me _ —”

“I don’t even _ know _ you,” Zarc said.

It was the wrong thing to say. Ruri’s head twisted back farther than a human head ought to — Reiji winced. Ray shrieked, an incoherent stream of absolute _ rage _ pouring out of her as she charged Zarc once again.

Zarc turned his palms to the ground, and a wave of shadow caught him underneath, launching him into the air. He flipped over her and landed on another wave of shadow, skidding down on it like it was a wave he was surfing, back down to the ground.

“Hey!!” he shouted. “If you aren’t more careful with that body, you’re gonna hurt it! You can’t move like a demon when you’re in a people body!”

Ray left another scorching, melted imprint where she had landed, whirling around to face him with her hair whipping about her furious face.

“Are you trying to _ lecture _ me about _ keeping humans safe _ ?” she shrieked. “After you _ murdered me _?”

She didn’t wait for an answer. Zarc’s mouth dropped open, momentarily shocked into stillness, and then Ray had him. Her hands latched around his neck and slammed him into the stone, so hard and with such demonic force that it pounded him into it, cracking the stone and forming a crater beneath him. Black shadow-like smoke billowed out from underneath him as he wrestled with Ray’s hands, his face starting to go red.

“This isn’t gonna kill me!” he gasped at her. “It’s only gonna kill the host body!”

“I can deal with that,” Ray hissed. “So long as this time you don’t run away from me afterward.”

Reiji should — he should do something. He needed to do something. What had happened to all his convictions of facing his sister, confronting her, trying to find a way to help her? It had all evaporated under the heat of the terror she had become — unrecognizable, not just because of the face she wore.

Zarc gagged, kicking. Then he pressed both his palms against her face, and Ray shrieked, staggering backwards. Zarc did not press his advantage — instead, he flipped backwards, opened his mouth, and black smoke poured from Yuuri’s lips. A moment later, Yuuri jerked, and slumped to the ground.

The black smoke shot off, almost invisible in the dark, and Ray whirled around as though to try to follow it. Was Zarc just _ running _?

“Ray,” Reiji gasped. “Ray, please!”

Ray couldn’t hear him. Her burning eyes raked the darkness, searching for where Zarc had fled to.

Suddenly, jerkily, Yuya, Yugo, and Yuto all leapt to their feet. Reiji sucked in a breath — Zarc had moved to another host, like Ray — but which of them? He couldn’t be in all three of them at once, could he?

Somehow simultaneously, all three boys — even Yuto, with his injured leg — bolted in opposite directions. Rin cried out for Yugo, and Yuzu, finally dragging herself to her feet, yelled to try and get Ray’s attention, but it was no good. Ray shrieked again.

Then in a haze of heat, she bolted after the nearest boy — Yuya.

Reiji tried to get up to his feet again, and collapsed in a heap of pain. Reira sobbed, shaking and crying.

He hadn’t...he hadn’t been able to do anything at all.

* * *

Okay. Okay okay okay okay this was definitely _ not _ the plan.

Zarc hated human lungs. They burned when you breathed too hard — what a _ terrible _ design! And they could only move their limbs and neck in so many directions before they broke, and their teeth just ground away if you tried to gnaw on anything harder than a corn cob, their night vision was absolute _ shit _ and they didn’t even have _ wings _. Human bodies: objectively The Worst.

Zarc bolted for the safety of the trees — in the dark, he might be able to hide. He could still smell her, on his tail, though. She couldn’t see him, not the way he could see her, burning inside of that girl’s soul, but she’d made a lucky guess. Still, once in the trees, he might have a better chance of getting his bearings back. 

_ And what if she doesn’t?? _

Yuya’s voice clattered around in Zarc’s head. He’d been surprisingly accommodating, not even bothering to ask questions when Zarc had leapt over to him instead of the other one. The other two had been, too, more than willing to try and cause some confusion once they’d heard him — this was actually pretty convenient. These kids might be human as they come, but they’d had pieces of Zarc in them for long enough that they could still hear him all at once.

“Look, I’m still working on this half of the plan, okay? Definitely didn’t expect to get set on by another, uber powerful demon as soon as I stumbled out on your world!”

_ Can you not fight her? _

Yuya’s body was a lot more limber than Yuuri’s, at least. Zarc leaped over a fallen trunk and then darted into the deep woods. He couldn’t go very far — he felt her barrier before he reached it, and turned aside. Damn, she was powerful.

“Fighting her one on one in the human world is a bad idea,” Zarc said. “She was human once, wasn’t she?”

_ Yeah...she was sacrificed six years ago when the cult was trying to summon you _.

Would explain why she was so pissed off with him. Why did humans always love the most violent option? Blood could summon him, but you didn’t need to use _ all _ of it. A prick of the finger would have done it.

“Well, here’s a little lesson for ya about demons, before she rips our head off,” Zarc said. He pressed himself back against a tree, sensing out the edge of her aura. It was _ big _. Very big. “Most demons are just demons. But sometimes, humans can become demons, if they die in a traumatizing enough way.”

She was already close. She didn’t know where he was, but she was close. He could smell it. He wrapped the shadows carefully around his borrowed body, hiding himself.

“But either way, she’s a demon. And demons aren’t the same as people. If we went toe to toe out here, if we didn’t rip our host bodies apart, we’d definitely do some serious damage to the world around us too. And like I said, this world is tied to mine. If it gets hurt, so does mine — so by the way, fix global warming.”

Yuya made a startled sound that might have been a laugh. Zarc pressed on.

“Anyway, humans-turned-demons are super volatile. They don’t know how to handle their demon parts. And from what pieces I’m getting from...all of this mess, she didn’t go to hell — didn’t even go to my world. She _ made _ her own little pocket dimension, she was so damn mad. Disrupted my summoning, it made so much energy.”

_ Is that the portal where she’s getting her power? _

Zarc quickly flipped through the surface memories of his new host, finding the image of the tunnels, and the portal with its chanting and shadows and overall creepy vibe.

“Yeah, that would be it. It's like a big anchor that keeps her able to stay on this side the way the rest of us can't. Full of all of her pent up emotions. Can’t blame her, after getting killed like that. Nasty way to go.”

Yuya didn’t respond for a moment.

_ You really aren’t at all what I thought you would be _, he said after a beat.

Zarc sighed, moving along the edges of Ray’s aura, keeping to the shadows. Her aura was so big that he didn’t know where she was within it. Had to be extra careful to stay out of her sight-line since he didn’t know where she was looking from.

“We really need a better PR team,” he said. “Okay, so I think I’ve got the other half of the plan. Maybe.”

_ Your confidence is amazing. _

“Can the sarcasm, kid. So that portal is where she’s getting her power. I can close it down. It might end up totally killing her though, if she’s not separated from it.”

_ You want to try to save her? _

“Kid, she’s a demon now. One of my guys. I don’t like to see them get hurt just because humans don’t understand them.”

That reminded him of his friends, then, and he fought back a pang of pain. Odd-Eyes, Clear Wing, Starving Venom, Dark Rebellion, and so many others...they were trapped here, desperate to go home. As he brushed over Yuya’s memories again, he could see it — that disgusting creature that was holding them captive. He ground his teeth.

“But listen, kid, I’m a demon too. And we don’t work for free. I’ll help you and your friends deal with your problem, but you’ve gotta do something in exchange for me.”

Yuya didn’t even hesitate.

_ That sounds fair _.

Zarc chuckled.

“You would suck at being a summoner,” he said. “What if I asked for your soul?”

_ It’d be worth my friends being safe. _

Zarc considered that a moment, then he smiled.

“You know, you kinda remind me of me,” he said. “Okay, kid. Deal’s a deal — I help you take care of your demon problem, then you have to help me exorcise that monster keeping my friends trapped.”

_ Deal! _

Zarc started to smile — maybe this would be even easier than he’d thought. He didn’t have to find loopholes in a contract circle, didn’t have to mess with any pesky demonologists with their annoying spells. Just one really pissed off demon, and he’d met a few of those.

He stopped smiling, however, when the trees above him spontaneously caught on fire, and she appeared right before him, hovering off the ground.

“You are not getting away from me again,” she hissed.

_ I think we need a new plan _, said Yuya.


	22. Chapter 22

Yuzu’s hands shook so badly that she couldn’t hold onto the altar, couldn’t get them underneath her to push herself up to her feet. Kurosaki tried to throw himself back to his feet, but a cry of pain ripped from his throat, and he crumpled back to the ground. 

Selena was the first to manage to get up, leaping to her feet and rushing first to Kurosaki. She dropped to a knee beside him, putting a hand against his chest, and then against his face and wincing.

“Don’t move,” she ordered him. “You’ve broken at least two ribs. Maybe four. She really walloped you.”

“Shut...up.”

Kurosaki groaned and tried to get back up again, actually growling when Selena held him down by his head and wrist. 

“I have to — get to — Ruri.”

“You can’t hep her like this!” Selena snapped, though her face was bone white, and her hands shook too. “You’re minutes from becoming a sack of flesh and she’s — Ray isn’t going to let her back out until she’s done.”

Kurosaki snarled. He didn’t actually try to get up again, though, perhaps the pain finally catching up to him. Reiji slipped in the blood as he made his way over to him, checking for the signs of Selena’s diagnosis. Yuzu could barely breathe, and all she could do for a moment was watch this play out.

“We wouldn’t have been in this damn mess if not for you,” Kurosaki spat at Selena.

Selena’s body tensed, but she did not flinch. She only looked away, going rigid.

“That’s enough,” Reiji told him, holding him by the other wrist. “Selena is just as much trapped in this game as we are.”

Kurosaki growled softly.

“Yeah, shut up,” Rin snapped at him. “You’re not the only one freaking out, and you’re not the only one who could lose someone!! That bitch went after my only friend!”

Rin used the altar to drag herself up to her feet, her legs shaking uncontrollably. She managed to stand up, though when she tried to take a step away from the altar, she immediately collapsed again. So it wasn’t just Yuzu feeling the weakness running through her body.

“Slow down,” Selena said, though the command had drained from her voice, and she sounded more afraid to speak than anything. “You aren’t used to calling across the veil — you’re going to be tired.”

“I can’t just sit here while — while that bitch uses Ruri to hunt down our friends!” Rin gasped. 

“She’s — she doesn’t know,” Selena whispered. “Ray doesn’t know the truth.”

“I don’t care! She should listen, then!! I don’t care if she died in an awful way, I don’t care if she was traumatized, that doesn’t mean she gets to kill our friends! You don’t get to use murder to cope!!”

Yuzu moved slower, trying to let her mind catch up with what was happening. She could hardly comprehend it all. They’d just summoned a  _ demon _ . She could still feel the fizzy tickle of energy that had flooded through her as she spoke the words that Selena had instructed them to use — words that she understood, even if she couldn’t have explained what they meant to anyone without using them. Words that made her whole body tremble with the power of them — she’d never known it could feel like there was an entire ocean inside you just from the words that came from your lips. She’d  _ felt _ the presence of Zarc, felt him push against the bubble of the veil between their world and his...and it hadn’t felt, well, infernal. It had almost felt warm: like the crackling of a fire in a fireplace, on a cool winter evening.

If Ray could only...if she’d only listened, if she could hear Zarc’s words, if she knew why he’d come...if she knew that the cult had hurt him as much as her...if she knew that her enemies were all defeated...

_ I think...I think we could convince her, if we could just  _ get _ to her _ , Yuzu thought.

Reiji swore, and Yuzu heard the scrabble of his feet as he got up — the scrabble of more feet against the stones.

“Reiji! What happened — what is —”

Yuzu choked on her breath when she heard something that sounded like the cocking back of a gun, then Selena gasping and Reiji grunting and something hitting the stones in a skidding sound. She pushed herself around the edge of the altar to try and see what had just happened.

A tall, broad man wrestled briefly with Reiji, but gave up quickly once Reiji ripped the gun from his back and flung it across the ground. He kicked the other fallen weapon aside.

“He is  _ unconscious _ !” Reiji swore at the man. “Father, he’s  _ unconscious _ , you’d shoot a defenseless person?”

Yuzu’s eyes slid over to where Yuuri laid across the ground, where Zarc and Ray had left him. His chest rose and fell ever so slightly, but he was out. Still...his breaths seemed more regular? Yuzu was trying her best to untangle everything that was happening.

The tall man drew back from Reiji, and Rin put both her fists up even though it was clear she could barely stand. Yuzu had no idea what was happening. Had Reiji called the man his father?

“What has  _ happened _ here?” Reiji’s father breathed, looking drawn.

“We summoned Zarc,” said Reiji flatly, and his father’s eyes bulged.

“You —”

“He’s not the problem here!” Rin shouted. “Your crazy daughter is the problem!”

“Who did you — you need a sacrifice to —”

“Are you implying that I would stoop to your level of sacrificing an innocent for my own agenda?” Reiji said through tight teeth, venom crackling through his normally even voice.

His father tensed, lips curling, but then his eyes flickered over Reiji’s battered body, the trembling Reira who clung to his back, and he dropped his gaze to the ground.

“We called across the veil and he came,” Selena mumbled. “He...he wasn’t what we thought he was.”

“He’s a monster,” Reiji’s father said, throat tight. “You brought that monster into the world!”

“Ray is the only one murdering innocents tonight,” Reiji said, and his voice grew so hollow at the words that it became brittle, cracking off into dust at the ends. “We were  _ all _ wrong, father. Zarc only came to rescue his kidnapped compatriots.”

“You would believe —”

“The Repository,” Selena said. “That monster you’ve seen before. It’s a prison cell for demons. Zarc...he came to save them. That’s all — he never wanted Ray to...”

Selena’s voice broke. Yuzu could hear the hurt, the confusion, the distress in every tremble of her tone. How much she be feeling, watching everything she knew come apart at the seams? Yuzu couldn’t bring herself to blame Selena anymore. She was lost and scared, as much as the rest of them. Yuzu’s head began to buzz. She felt sick. 

They were  _ all _ lost and scared, and there seemed to be no way out of this nightmare.

Rin began yelling again, and Kurosaki tried though he didn’t seem to have enough air in his lungs to do so. Selena whispered in response, sounded as though she were too afraid to speak any louder. Reiji’s voice tried to lift above the others, but it was no use. Reiji’s father tried to cut in, and Reiji snapped back at him, shaming him back into silence. Yuzu didn’t hear the words as much as she only heard the sounds, the undertones, the feelings and worries and fears, fears that echoed within her own mind as well. Yuzu’s hands shook in her lap. Yuya was out there. Yuya was out there, and he was running and scared, he was trying to do what he could, and she needed...she needed to do something. He’d come all this way just to save her. She had to do something for him.

No, not just him. She had to do something for all of them.

And that included Ray.

It was strange, but as soon as that desire clicked in her mind, she felt the shakiness of her body melt away. She stood, using the altar for support, but finding she didn’t need it. The movement of her rising up from behind the altar caught the attention of the others. Rin let her sentence trail off, and Selena looked up at her. Reiji’s father frowned to see her appear.

Yuzu looked at each of them, feeling the strength slowly flood her muscles again. Kurosaki, injured on the ground. Selena, broken and scared, and uncertain of where to go from here. Rin, terrified and impulsive, desperate to put herself in harm’s way to save who was important to her. Reira, scared and too young to be here, the only one who could truly feel the weight of the horrors that surrounded them, and breaking under the weight of it. Yuuri, still unconscious after his possession, laying in a deep sleep across the ground, though looking surprisingly unharmed. Reiji’s father, a man who looked for all the world as though he were beginning to deflate. Reiji, who looked as though he hadn’t slept in years, the weight of loss, exhaustion, and responsibility dragging down at his shoulders. And out there in the woods, Yuya, Yuto, and Yugo were all fighting their hardest to save everyone.

She was so  _ scared _ . She was so tired. She was frightened out of her mind and she could hardly stand, hardly think, still thinking about the blood all over her arms and clothes, the bodies, the terrible crackling energy in the air that seemed to suck the air out of her. Was this how Ray had felt? Was this panic and hopelessness the feeling that Ray had held within her since her death?

But Yuzu had one Ray hadn’t. She wasn’t alone.

“Ray was like us,” Yuzu said, her voice trembly at first, but growing stronger the more she tried, her eyes lingering on Rin and Selena first. “She was trapped, she was scared...but she was all alone.”

She met each of their eyes in turn, looking for something that she didn’t have the name for yet.

“I think she must still be scared. Still all alone. I think that’s why she called to you, and brought you here — so that she could feel like she wasn’t.”

She looked at Reiji, Reiji’s father, and Reira this time, and Reiji’s hand tightened against Reira’s shoulders.

“But she’s still all alone. She still thinks of herself as alone, and she’s going to think that forever — her death...it hurt her too much. And for all of her power, for all of the power she’s trying to take back, after it was taken from her...she still doesn’t realize that she doesn’t have to be alone anymore.”

Yuzu blinked back tears. Her throat got thick — she thought, for a moment, how horrifying it might have been. To have been brought here and locked away without Rin and Ruri to help her. For Yuya to have never come to save her. To have been dragged helplessly to this altar and killed, with no one here to save her, or even to be with her.

She closed her eyes, pressing her clasped hands against her heart, feeling the way it beat against her palms. She felt it again, that slithering feeling she remembered from Ray in her mind — only this time, she remembered how lonely it felt.

“I think we can get to that Ray,” she said. “The Ray who loves her family, who protected Selena, who wanted to save me and the other girls from her fate. I think if we cancall to her, I think we can show her that everything is all right. That it’s over, and that she isn’t alone anymore.”

“The cult...” Reiji’s father started.

“If they’re stupid enough to think to try this again after what Ray has done tonight, then we’ll deal with them then,” Yuzu said, opening her eyes. “After all, Rin, Selena, Ruri, and I...well, it seems we can call across the veil on our own, can’t we?”

Selena blinked, lips parting. Then she frowned, nodding to something only she seemed to understand. She did not interrupt.

“I don’t want Ray to end things like this,” Yuzu said. “Not just because she’d be killing my best friend! But because I think I might have been her, too — and if I was, I wouldn’t want this to be how I ended things!”

Rin bit her lip. Selena looked like she was going to cry. Yuzu tightened her hands together and looked directly at Reiji this time.

“If we can bring her back here,” she said. “Do you think you can help her?”

Reiji’s eyes hardened. His hand tightened on Reira again. And he nodded, sharply.

“I won’t run away from her again.”

His eyes turned to his father, then and for a moment, his father hesitated. 

“You can’t believe that you have to enable this in order to atone,” Reiji said. “What you need to do is be her father.”

Reiji’s father seemed to wither. His eyes dropped to the ground. As though he couldn’t find it in himself to speak, he nodded. Reiji turned back to Yuzu.

“What do you have in mind?”

Yuzu smiled. She dropped her hands to her sides.

“Akaba-san, you have a mirror don’t you?” she said. “Ray can reach us through them — so let’s see if we can reach her.”

* * *

The three girls clustered around father’s tiny hand mirror, Yuzu holding onto it in between them. Reiji got his father to help him move Yuuri and Kurosaki, as carefully as possible, to some place that would be outside Ray’s splash zone, tucking them safely in the bushes. Yuuri seemed physically fine after Zarc had taken the bullet out of his body, but he was still out cold — and Kurosaki was too injured to even move. Then Reiji returned to the circle, near the girls, and waited with tense muscles for his sister to arrive. 

“Ray!” Yuzu called at her reflection. “Ray, can you hear me? Please, come back!”

“Ray, you owe us!” Rin said. “Get back here and talk to us!”

“Ray, please,” Selena whispered. “Please...I want to talk to you. I want to...I want to listen. I don’t want you to...to hurt anymore.”

Was it going to work? Would Ray be swayed from her quest for revenge, even at the voices of the girls calling out to her? Had she already hurt or...or killed one of the boys? Reiji’s hand tightened on Reira’s. He’d tried to ask Reira to stay with the injured, but Reira didn’t want to leave Ray, either. Their father stood beside them, awkward and silent, looking pained. 

Reiji tried to think — what would he even say when he saw her again? How would he get through to her? His sister. The sister who had been there for him throughout his life. She’d always been the one to comfort and support him, never the other way around. But he couldn’t leave her. Not like this. He couldn’t let his sister become a murderer of innocents. The deaths of the cult, those he could forgive — those he felt no regrets for, and even approved. But for her to kill Yuya and the others...that would send his sister down a path he couldn’t follow.

He had to make her see that.

“Ray,” Yuzu said again. “Ray, please, your family is here, they’re waiting to see you, they  _ need _ you. They need you more than this.”

Reiji breathed in as steady as he could. He waited, helpless, and clinging desperately to what little hope he had left.

* * *

_ Ray! _

_ Ray, please listen. _

_ Ray, your family needs you! _

Ray pressed her hands against her ears, but she couldn’t block out the sounds. The girls’ voices could have found her anywhere if they were calling to her — that was the kind of power they had, and the kind of creature she had become. Beholden to the sound of the girls’ whose voices crossed the veil. But with the mirror they were using, it was like having a megaphone blasted through her head.

“Shut up,” she hissed, Ruri’s voice twisting with her own. “Shut up! I can’t come back until I’ve  _ finished _ this!”

Zarc limped backwards from her aura, taking advantage of her hesitation. She’d managed to injure one of his legs, but the power of his infernal presence was already knitting the wound back together. If she wanted to destroy him, she’d need to land it with a single blow. If she wanted to take  _ revenge _ — 

“Ray, please!”

The voice that tumbled from the boy’s lips wasn’t the demon’s — it was the boy underneath. The demon host, the damnable false face the demon had crafted in order to hide himself, the fake personality it was trying to appeal to her with — 

“Zarc doesn’t want to hurt you! He didn’t ever want to!” the boy begged. “The cult wanted to use him, too! They stole —”

“Shut up!” Ray shrieked. “Shut up! Shut  _ up _ ! I won’t listen to your  _ lies _ ! You took  _ everything  _ from me!”

_ Ray, please...Reiji, Reira, your father, they’re all here, waiting for you, they need you. You aren’t alone — you don’t have to do everything by yourself! You can listen to them! _

Ray tried to ignore the tears rolling down her cheeks, so hot that they turned to steam as they dripped from her cheeks.

“If you keep this up, you’re going to burn out.” It was  _ him _ again, the real demon, his eyes bright and gold and fixed on her as he slowly backed away from the flames that surrounded her. “Listen to me — you’re not used to this. You’re not used to being a demon. You’re going to burn out, using your powers like this. I want to  _ help _ .”

It was that more than anything that seized her with rage. He wanted to  _ help _ ? He wanted to  _ HELP?? _

“If you want to help, then you can  _ die _ ,” she hissed, and she threw herself at him.

He was faster than her, just barely, though she felt her heat scorch against him. His aura flared a moment, battling with hers before he pulled it back, tucked back beneath his human skin again. Still lying. Still trying to  _ lie _ . He darted back into the trees, and she was on his tail.

She felt distantly her borrowed body straining with pain against her movements, but she didn’t pay attention to it. It would hold. She would make it hold. The girl would have to understand.

“You think you can keep taking things from me!” she shrieked. “You took my  _ life _ , you took my  _ humanity _ , now you’re trying to turn my  _ family _ against me?”

“I’m not doing shit,” Zarc shouted back at her. “I didn’t do  _ shit _ ! I’m trying to  _ talk _ to you!”

She screamed, her throat nearly bleeding at the sound that wasn’t supposed to come out of a human throat, and crashed into him. He gasped as she pinned him down to the ground. Her hands latched against the back of his head, shoving him down, pinning him with her knees into his back. She’d snap his neck — 

He swore, and a cool ripple of shadow melted over him, causing her fingers to slip as though she were trying to grip oil. He  _ slithered _ from underneath her, as though he’d sunk into the shadows and then stumbled out of it. He swore as he wiped scales from his arms, pearly silver things that had sprouted from his human skin — they dusted off of him like dandruff, scattering to the ground.

“If we don’t both calm down, these humans are going to  _ die _ ,” Zarc said. “Is that what you want?? Do you hate me so much that you’ll kill humans to get to me?”

She barely even heard him. Her mind swirled with the sounds of the girls still calling to her, with her own anger, with the fire that raced through every inch of her. She couldn’t — she wouldn’t — listen. Not anymore. Not to a monster. Not to a monster who had convinced the sacrifices that he cared about them — who had somehow convinced her  _ family _ that he was no threat. If she didn’t destroy him — would they be next?

She had no intention of living past tonight. She would not leave behind any loose ends.

“I have waited for years to kill you,” she said. “I am not letting you slip away from me now!”

Zarc swore as she sent a rain of fire down on him again, setting the forest ablaze. A wave of cold shadows roiled out from under his feet, washing over the flames and extinguishing them. Smoke billowed up from the doused flames, covering his form for a moment. When she burst through the pillars of smoke, he’d disappeared.

Not for long. She  _ would _ find him. She would not allow him to escape, to cause another tragedy.

She stalked through the smoke, swinging her head from side to side. Even in the dark, she could see as clearly as day. Still, he seemed to have found a hiding place. Where had he gone?

Something rustled in the bushes, and she whipped towards it. A boy darted out of the foliage and bolted back through the trees. It wasn’t the same one — it was one of the other fakes. Had the demon swapped bodies again? Snarling, she went after his fleeing back, trying to keep sight of his spiky blue hair. Her fire preceded her, the flames licking at his heels.

When she was inches from him, close enough to snatch him by the hair, shadows once again doused her flames and sent up a pillar of unnatural black smoke, causing him to slip from her grasp. No sooner had she stumbled through the smoke than she saw yet another one of them, the black-haired one this time, bolting away from her. Her lips curled back from her teeth in a snarl. Were they  _ toying _ with her? They’d regret that.

With a shriek, she sent a wave of fire after the boy — he vanished into a mote of shadow before the flames reached him. She whirled around, looking for some sign of him.

“Ray — that’s your name, right? Listen, Ray, I just wanna talk. I don’t want to fight, I don’t want to hurt anyone, I just want to talk. We can talk, can’t we? Humans love talking. They never shut up.”

His voice seemed to come from all around her, and she screamed, more fire cascading from her skin. The air crackled and burned as even the dust in the air caught fire.

“Get out here and  _ fight me _ !” she shrieked. “You coward!”

“See, okay, it’s not cowardly to avoid a fight when it’s not necessary, though. Listen I’ve had my fair share of stupid fights, I should know.”

His voice felt like nails against a chalkboard to her — his casual tone, unbefitting the moment she’d worked her entire  _ life _ for. As though this were nothing more than a game.

_ Ray! _

_ He’s out here, Ray, with us! _

Ray sucked in a breath, her eyes flickering briefly to the eyes of the girl whose face centered in the mirror. Yuzu, her blue eyes looking at her own reflection, and at the young man behind her, standing there with his golden eyes looking somehow straight at her, as though he knew she were there.

A shriek escaped her once again — before she could crawl through the reflection, however, and into the girl who met her gaze, Yuzu dropped the mirror and it shattered. Ray was still in the middle of the burning woods in Ruri’s body — she could not flee straight to his location. She would have to go on foot.

Hovering inches above the ground, flames spat in her wake as she shot back through the trees. She burst through a tree trunk, shattering it in a rain of wood as she bore straight back out into the summoning circle, a horrible copy of the last scene she had seen before she died. And he was waiting for her there, as though  _ mocking _ her, as though  _ mocking _ her death, standing in front of the altar like the one where she’d been murdered. Her eyes were locked onto him, so narrow focused, so tense as she drew in her power to rage against him — so focused that she didn’t notice him until he’d stepped in front of her.

Everything in her froze back to ice, her flames dying, turning to particles of snow around her as she met his eyes, the same calm, unwavering expression he’d always had, looking out from a face much older than she remembered. He was...standing in her way. In harm’s way.

“Oneesama,” Reiji said, his voice wavering, and only now did she see the tremble in his hands, a tremble she knew he never would have let her see before.

“Reiji,” she whispered, her throat freezing over. “Reiji, get away from him. It’s not safe.”

Reiji did not move from his place. Did not take his eyes away from her.

“Not safe from what?” he asked, his voice leveling, but only barely. “From him? Or from you?”

It cracked something inside of Ray, and the air melted out of her.

It seemed, for a moment, as though everything in her simply stopped.


	23. Chapter 23

For the first time, Reiji saw what his sister had become.

Ruri’s body stood before him, but the flames, and then the ice that wreathed her shape, it was decidedly not Ruri. Her eyes were no longer magenta, or even the endless black of before. They were doors into a realm of fire and ice, crackling and freezing all at once. The heat and the cold of her emotions, of her fear. She still hovered inches from the ground, Ruri’s hair freed from its bun and flowing around her like a living cape. Something inhuman seemed to layer over the top of her — as though if Reiji only squinted, he might see the mirage of the demon shape his sister now took on, hovering like a mist inches over Ruri’s skin and obscuring the true owner of the body from view.

Ray did not move towards Reiji. She didn’t attempt to move around him to where Zarc, in Yuya’s body again, waited near the altar, as Reiji had feared she might. It seemed he’d captured her attention.

Reiji sucked in a painful breath, his ribs protesting at being extended. Ray’s flickering eyes wrinkled with a sudden, terrified concern.

“You’re hurt,” she mumbled, tumbling out of her as though she didn’t notice the slip. “Was it —”

“He did not hurt me,” Reiji said, struggling to keep his voice calm. And it was a struggle — more than it ever had been in his life. He hadn’t been prepared, for all of his mental fortitude, to see her. To see his sister — to really see her. To face her like this. 

It  _ was _ her. Even in Ruri’s face, he could see Ray. He saw the expressions he remembered so well, the way she bit her lip when she was nervous, the opening and closing of her hands that she thought no one could see. Gestures he thought he would never see again. A primal, instinctive fear rose up in him when faced with the crackling force of her presence, and it mixed into a horrible cocktail of uncertainty and actual  _ relief _ — relief at seeing her again. The sister he thought gone forever.

But  _ could _ he reach her? He hadn’t even been able to convince his father of the folly of this — and Ray had had six years to stew in her pain, to formulate her will. What could Reiji do?

Reira’s hand tightened on Reiji’s, and Reiji could feel them trembling. Still, they didn’t move away, and when Ray’s eyes dropped to Reira, she tensed up. Her eyes lifted back to Reiji’s.

“Please,” she said, and her vibrating, inhuman voice, both Ray’s and Ruri’s and neither of theirs, made Reiji feel like his stomach was about to empty itself. “Move out of the way.”

Reiji tightened his grip on Reira’s hand.

“No.”

Fire licked at the place where Ray’s feet almost touched the ground, but the air was still icy cold, and breathing was hard.

“You weren’t supposed to see this,” Ray said.

“Then why did you bring us here?”

Ray looked down at the ground. She was trembling.

“So I could say goodbye.”

Reiji tightened his grip on Reira’s hand, and Reira let out a tiny whimper. Reiji wanted to look down at them, to comfort them, but he didn’t dare take his eyes away from Ray.

“I was supposed to finish it faster,” she whispered. “I was supposed to be done. Then I could...one last time...”

“I’m here now,” Reiji said, lowering his voice. “We’re all here now, oneesama.”

“Oneesama,” Reira whispered. “Oneesama...please.”

Reiji took a small step towards her. Reira came with him. Reiji didn’t know if his father moved closer, either, or if he remained where he was. Reiji did not care. His father had done enough. It was their turn.

This moment was just for him, Reira, and Ray. And he was not going to let it slip.

Ray would not look at him. She hovered closer to the ground now.

“You’ve been alone for so long,” Reiji said. “I can’t begin to imagine what that felt like. But you’re not alone anymore. This burden is no longer just yours.”

“I have to finish it,” Ray said, her voice edging sharply for a moment. “I have to  _ finish _ it. They can never hurt you again.”

“Oneesama,” Reiji said. “You’ve already saved all of us. It’s finished.”

“It’s not. Not until I —”

Reiji was close enough to reach out to her now. Despite the fire that licked at the stones, it was so cold here that he felt the hair on his arms and neck icing at the tips. His breaht came out in white gusts.

“Ray,” he said. “You’re  _ safe _ .”

The word seemed to strike Ray to her core. She began to tremble — to vibrate from within as though something were shaking her. Her feet hit the ground and she stumbled as she stood like a human again. The haze that surrounded her wavered. Her hair fell limply against her back.

“He’s going to hurt you,” Ray said. “He’s going to — he took everything —”

“It’s all right to be afraid,” Reiji said, wondering if he could reach for her now. “But you are not alone. The cult is dead. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

“He must be lying. He has to be lying. He killed me. He’ll kill you too.”

“Ray, I cannot watch my sister turn into a murderer,” Reiji said. “It’s me, Ray. Will you at least listen to me? Can we talk?”

“He’ll lie.”

“If he does, then, you can protect us. But can’t we listen? You trust me, don’t you, oneesama?”

Ray’s eyes finally lifted to his. The fire and ice, the endless black, it was all gone. He saw  _ her _ eyes: the pale lavender, the human irises and pupils. His sister’s eyes. She trembled, as though she might come apart. Her mouth opened and closed.

“Please,” Reiji said. This time, he reached for her hand, holding his out, but not taking it, waiting for her to reach to him. He felt the tears beginning to threaten at his eyes. “I don’t want this to be the way we say goodbye.”

Ray’s eyes widened. She sucked in a breath. The tremble overtook her whole body, and it looked as though she might collapse. Slowly, her fingers turned towards his. They moved towards his hand. They drew back. They moved towards his hand again. He did not move, despite the tremble in his own hands. He stayed where he was, waiting, hoping, praying — 

A terrible snarl escaped Zarc’s throat from behind. One of the girls screamed.

Then suddenly, Reiji was flung forward, smacking into Ray and sending them both down to the ground as something swiped over their heads. He heard a swear, the cracking of bones, and then another shriek. Ray’s arms flung around Reiji and Reira both, shooting back up to a hover as she dragged them back. She choked with surprise. Reiji tried desperately to turn in her grip, trying to figure out what had happened.

Yuzu shrieked.

“Put him  _ down _ !!”

For a moment, Reiji thought she was screaming at Ray, and tried to yell that he was safe, he was fine, Ray wasn’t hurting him, oh  _ god _ he couldn’t let this fall apart  _ now  _ — 

Then Ray put the both of them down, still clinging tight as she stared, open-mouthed at what was behind them. Reiji got his head to turn around.

The Repository, mouth gaping in a drooling grin, lifted up Yuya’s body held in a crushing grip in its giant hand. Zarc coughed, and blood trickled from his lips, golden eyes fluttering with pain and rage — but even he couldn’t seem to escape the monster’s grip. Its skin roiled with even more desperation than before, faces trying to claw their way free, screams vibrating just out of reach of Reiji’s range of hearing so that a headache began to spread through his mind.

The creature squeezed tighter, and Zarc gasped out a fresh bubble of blood, eyes bulging, feet kicking uselessly. Black smoke began to trickle from Yuya’s lips, and Zarc’s eyes flickered — desperately clinging to Yuya even as the pain threatened to drive him out of him.

“Oh my god,” Ray whispered.

_ God was never here _ , Reiji thought.

* * *

Ray did not know what was happening.

Zarc had clearly been...had been  _ using _ her siblings, hadn’t he? But Reiji had sounded so calm. So assured. So  _ himself _ . Reiji had always been the logical one. Even Zarc couldn’t have somehow turned Reiji against her. And then Reira.

Reira, her darling baby sibling, the child who’d always had so much power, even before Ray had known how to see it. Reira physically — Reira physically couldn’t be affected by demons. Their psychic powers were too strong. With a little refinement, they would be the greatest weapon against demons.

Half the reason Ray had brought them here to such a dangerous place had been because — because at the end of all of this, Reira would have been able to erase her.

Zarc couldn’t have turned Reira against her. If Zarc had been dangerous, Reira would have not followed Reiji — they would have understood just how dangerous it was. As Reiji had tried to reach out to her, those had been the thoughts running through her head.

And then that creature had appeared, and Zarc had — 

Zarc had just saved her brother’s life.

Zarc cried out a thin, squeezed sound, and Ray could hear the ribs cracking in his host body.

“Bitch!” Zarc gasped, voice so thin you could barely hear it. “Shit.”

The smoke dribbled out of his mouth and ears and nose, and yet he still tried to suck it back in — he could  _ escape _ . He had other hosts! He could get away! Why wasn’t he escaping? Was he...no. He couldn’t be. All that talk of protecting his host body had been lies, hadn’t it?

But it was true that if he left his host body now...without the demonic power running through it, it would likely die the instant Zarc left it. As long as Zarc clung on through the pain, he would continually heal...but if he didn’t get out of there soon — that monster was going to — 

The monster grinned widely, showing off its horrible teeth. Yuzu had picked up some fallen rocks, screaming and yelling as she flung them uselessly at the monster. Rin and Yugo had both charged, grabbing at the creature’s legs, clawing and punching as though they could rip the demons out of it. Demons, Ray was only now realizing, were...trying to  _ escape _ .

_ They’re...trapped in there _ , it dawned on her slowly.  _ They’re  _ conscious _ . _

The thought suddenly made her stomach roil, even though she thought she couldn’t feel nausea. Zarc coughed again and she heard the sound of bones popping back into place before being crunched again.

“B-bastard,” he gasped. “G-give them b-back...l-let them o-out...”

The monster only grinned, wildly. Its mouth opened wider and wider, wider than Ray thought humanly possible. Its teeth parted, revealing the gaping  _ abyss _ inside. Zarc gasped — his eyes bulged. The smoke began to leak from his mouth again, this time moving as though being suctioned inside the darkness. Oh — oh fuck.

It was trying to  _ eat _ him.

“Oneesama!” 

Reira’s scream drew Ray snapping back to the moment, whirling back towards Reira. Reiji, pale-faced, clung to their sibling, holding them against him as Reira tried to squirm from his grip. They pointed wildly at the creature.

“If it — if it absorbs him — it’ll be too strong!” they screamed.

Ray whirled back towards the monster. The smoke was so close to being dragged inside and yet — Zarc kept fighting. He tried to rip himself back into his host body, fighting for his life. 

For a moment, the world felt silent. Ray watched in slow motion the scene before her. A scene she was never prepared to see.

Yuzu, even Selena, screaming and yelling and throwing anything they could reach. Pale-faced Yuto swinging a stick at the creature’s side. Rin and Yugo trying to actively rip into the creature with nothing but their fingernails, desperately and fighting and...and not giving up. And Zarc. Zarc, fighting. Fighting to...to protect the boy he’d inhabited. Trapped because he’d...because he’d saved her siblings’ lives.

Zarc. Her mortal enemy. The creature she’d spent what remained of her existence fighting to destroy.

Something soft brushed against her mind. She sucked in a breath as she realized the touch. Ruri had slipped back out from where Ray had tucked her. She felt a hand lay against hers, squeezing — Ruri wasn’t taking back control. She was...only whispering.

_ You have to remember why you were fighting in the first place _ , Ruri whispered into her ears.

Ray sucked in a breath. Ice settled in her lungs. She set it alight with flames.

The monster screamed the scream of a thousand voices when her fire sliced through its arm. The arm collapsed to the ground so hard it left a dent in the stone, but the hand flopped open and let Zarc crumple out of it. He wheezed and gasped for breath. His healing had slowed down, but his smoke flooded back under Yuya’s skin while he laid, twitching but still very much alive.

Ray walked until she stood in front of him. He only laid there, twitching and gasping for breath while the monster staggered backwards, screaming while blood spurted from its arm. Ray ignored it for now, her eyes on her enemy. He was at her mercy, now. He couldn’t do anything to stop her.

Perhaps that was why his eyes widened slightly when she reached a hand to him, offering him assistance.

He took it, though, letting her help him to his feet. She stared at him — really looked at him. Through the skin of the boy he wore. There was something...warm about the presence of his soul. So unlike the demonic presence she had imagined. So unlike...her own. It upset her in a way she couldn’t express.

“I still don’t know if I believe you,” she said. “Or trust you.”

Zarc coughed, and sucked up the last of his lost blood back through his lips while his ribs cracked back into place.

“Hun, if you want someone to turn that streak of vengeance on,” he said. “Look to  _ that _ thing.”

He jerked his thumb at the monster, which had staggered to a stop, staring almost blankly now at its stumpy arm.

“That’s the last one,” Zarc said. “Cultist, I mean. Don’t let his act fool you. He’s completely aware of what he’s doing.”

Ray’s eyes slid to the monster. She could see it, now. The bars that held the demons in its skin captive, that burned at them when they tried to escape. The malicious gleam in its eye, the hungry glint in its teeth when it locked onto her and Zarc.

“If you want a monster, you have one,” Zarc said, his lips curling with anger. “He won’t stop until he’s consumed every demon. And that includes you, sweetstuff.”

She bristled at the nickname, but she couldn’t seem to put any heart into it. Ray looked at him one last time.

“You really came here to save them?” she said.

Zarc met her eyes. Gold to lavender. The gaze did not falter.

“I know you’ve got a low opinion of demons,” he said. “I did too, the first time I became one. In fact, I think I had a messier first time party than you have so far.”

Ray’s lips parted.

“You...”

“We’re not too different, you know,” he said, looking away from her. “But I can tell you that story some other time. I’m here to save my friends.”

Ray turned her eyes back towards the creature. She tensed as she watched the blood from its stumpy arm splurt out, solidify, and grow into a new arm — this one blackened, like charred tree wood, and twisted with veins that bulged from the skin.

“You saved my siblings,” she said. She hesitated. “Thank you.”

“Later, hon,” said Zarc, flexing his fingers as they both tensed, facing down the creature that now honed on them. “Let’s take care of this first.”


	24. Chapter 24

Yuzu couldn’t breathe, and it wasn’t just from the fear and panic, wasn’t just from the ghost image of her best friend being squeezed to death in the hand of a monster. 

It was the air itself, suddenly hot and thick like trying to breath down fire. It was so heavy that it felt as though her ribs might crack under the strain of it, as she staggered down to one knee under the weight of the broken stone she had picked up to throw at the monster that had tried to kill Yuya. The presence that filled the air actually  _ sparked _ , she saw little flickers of static electricity popping like stars among the clouds of black smoke that began to bubble and spiral to surround the summoning circle. And yet, her body felt cold, hairs standing on end and goosebumps rising from her skin at the icy air that bit at her.

She watched, wide eyed, pigtails sagging from their ties and into her eyes, at the backs of the two forces that were facing the monster down —  _ together _ .

Ruri’s hair flapped around her like a cape, like she had her own personal windstorm — no, not Ruri. Even though it was her body, Yuzu couldn’t see her as that. A haze surrounded her, lifted like a mirage from her skin, like steam escaping her pores and weaving a hazy image over the top of her. Her shadow was too long, too visible for the lack of light in the dark night, and it was strangely shaped — something human, but with claws and spikes and horns and other things humans should not have. The ice of the air and the fire of Yuzu’s breaths seemed to emanate from her like a cloud. This...this was Ray.

And against all odds, against any possibility she could have imagine for this night, at her side was Yuya — no, not Yuya. Zarc. He, too, was encased in a strange, warping haze that seemed to emanate from somewhere inside him like a cloud of ash from a volcano, creating just barely-there glimpses of the creature that Zarc must be on the inside — flashes of silver scales, black tipped spikes, glowing green tattoos, the faintest flicker of bat-like wings. A second shade spread from his borrowed feet, tangling with Ray’s, and yet somehow perfectly separate, perfectly visible, not at all blending into hers, as though somehow they were two different, vibrant colors. The sparks of electricity in the air danced off his skin, played through his flapping hair and across the goggles of his borrowed head.

Zarc shot forward first — faster than any human should be able to move, even Yuya with his athletic body. He moved like a blur, skidding to a stop inches from the monster, one hand drawn back — then striking against the monster’s stomach.

The creature only grinned as the blow seemed to simply sink into its horrible, bubbling skin. Yuzu felt bile rise in her throat and slapped her hand to her mouth.

Then a smirk tugged at the corner of Zarc’s lips. The monster hesitated in the middle of reaching for him.

The black smoke that had surrounded the circle suddenly went solid — spikes like huge barbed wire thorns burst from within it, and in a breath, hundreds of spikes had punched into the bubbling monster right where Zarc had struck him.

It  _ howled _ . Yuzu shrieked, clapping her hands over her ears at the same time as everyone else around her. The terrible sound wasn’t just one voice — it was  _ thousands _ , thousands of horrified, anguished voices, but so inhuman that her whole body wanted to turn itself inside out at the sound of it.

The monster shrieked again, then swung its massive arms around it like a windmill. The strike shattered the black spikes into brilliant obsidian dust, which melted back into smoke. The smoke lashed itself back towards Zarc, who jumped back, whipping his own arms around himself to bend the smoke around him in a vicious whirlwind.

Just as the monster was beginning to lunge for him, Ray materialized behind it. It didn’t have the time to turn around before she raised her hands over her head, a sickening black ooze rolling from under her sleeves and down her arms to her fingers, and she cast it down on it in a deluge of acid rain. The skin boiled and scarred every place Ray’s malice touched it, though the bubbling, desperate faces pressing through the skin did not manage to escape. 

While it was turning to face Ray again, Zarc took advantage of its distraction. He flung his smoke at it, this time driving it into every open orifice, forcing it into the monsters eyes and throat. He clenched his fists and slammed them against each other. 

Yuzu  _ did _ throw up this time, when the spikes exploded from inside the creature, bursting through skin and up through its mouth and throat, an explosion of blood following in its wake. There was no scream this time, but there was sickening, out of tune buzz that was just out of range of her hearing that made her want to throw up again, spitting the bile from her retching onto the stones.

She wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, feeling far too trembly to even think about getting back up. The creature twitched a few times, gurgling and bleeding around its spikes. Then it slowly, slowly, seemed to fall still.

Ray lowered herself almost to the ground, lavender eyes narrow, and Zarc tensed. For a long, long moment, no one moved — no one hardly even breathed.

_ Is...is it over? _ Yuzu thought, swallowing through the bad taste in her throat.

“Kid,” Zarc said through a raspy throat, and for a moment, Yuzu wasn’t sure who he was talking to. “Now’s about the time you exorcise this thing for real.”

Yuzu’s lips parted, and she flicked her eyes to where Zarc was looking. Reiji had Reira clutched to his chest, hunched over them at a distance from the fight. Leo stood over them, half leaned over the top of them as though he might be able to shield them. At Zarc’s words, however, Reira gasped softly. They wriggled themselves out of Reiji’s grip, despite Reiji’s attempt to hold onto them. Shaking slightly, Reira turned to face the creature.

Ray watched it for a long moment. Her eyes slipped away from it, then, and she actually touched the ground, stepping back from it. Her eyes slid back towards her family, and she stepped towards Reira, arms outstretched.

Yuzu saw the hand twitch first. Her eyes widened. She tried to stand. She tried to force sound through her throat.

“Ray!” Selena shrieked.

Ray whipped around, eyes widening — 

Not fast enough.

In one motion, the creature  _ ripped _ out of the spikes, shattering them, and  _ roared _ . The energy that pulsed out of the creature was enough to send Yuzu flying through the air, tumbling head over heels and screaming. She landed hard face first on the grass beyond the summoning circle. The air roared — smoke and electricity and temperature alike were all blown to pieces, dashed against the ground.

Yuzu clung to the ground, pressing into the grass and trying to squint through the tears in her eyes from the wind. She heard screaming, yelling, the shrieking of the thousands of demons again — shit, she couldn’t see! What could she...what could she — she had to do something!

The pressure in the air pinned her to the ground, as though gravity had just increased. She couldn’t breathe again, but not because of Zarc’s and Ray’s presences. Tears squeezed from her eyes as she tried to force air into her lungs, tried to get her arms underneath her so that she could see what was happening — so that she could help!

_ What can I even do, though _ ? she thought, despair weighing her down even more.  _ I’m not a psychic, or a demon! What can I... _

She finally managed to suck in a clear, resonating breath. It broke over her like the dawn that she still wasn’t sure was ever coming.

The words. The words of the veil — that Selena knew — 

Yuzu grabbed fistfuls of grass, dragging herself to her hands and knees. Every bit of her was smudged with dirt and blood, every bit of her shook as though she were about to fall apart, but kept pushing. 

She had to help them. She had to find Selena in this chaos, and she had to find out what she could do.

* * *

Zarc swore, throwing more of his rage at the creature. This time, though, his spikes couldn’t even break the skin. A powerful barrier protected it now, a power forced out of an unwilling, trapped demon. It was enough to flare Zarc’s rage even deeper, causing his smoke to roil around him, the fire within him that powered the ashen rage cracking all through his body — but he had to keep it in  _ check _ , or he could burn Yuya clean out of himself. Dammit!

Ray shrieked with a terrible rage, her malice forming into acid once again — but she had to swing it back away from the monster when it grinned, swinging its arm back around with the captive Reira in it towards her so that attacks would hit him instead.

Reira only barely grasped for air, caught in the creature’s hand. Dammit!! The thing was too fast now, finally tapping into the strength of all of the thousands of demons it had consumed — Zarc was pretty freaking powerful, one of  _ the _ most powerful demons in his world (not to brag or anything), and Ray was about on level with him or maybe even stronger — and had a little less scruples about overextending her host body, so she wasn’t quite as handicapped as he was. But this thing was  _ so many demons _ rolled into one. Could they really not beat this thing??

And this fucked up host had finally figured out that Reira was an esper! If they didn’t act fast, that thing was going to just straight up  _ kill _ them instead of using them as a shield, get rid of the danger of losing its captives altogether.

Reira grit their teeth, wriggling uselessly in the monster’s grip. Ray shrieked again, swapping from her malice to her rage, bringing a sword of fire to her hands again. She tried to slice the monster’s arm off, like she had to save Zarc — but the fire glanced off, dissipating as it passed through, and Ray overcompensated, hitting the ground so hard she cracked it in a crater around herself with the force of her barrier trying to protect herself from the impact.

It was enough of a slip up for the monster to seize her by the back with its free hand, dragging her up to him. She fought like a mad hurricane as it lifted her up towards its mouth, opening wide and beginning to inhale the edges of her soul, trying to pull her out of Ruri — and all the while, her bursting at the seams with demonic energy, flares of lightning and fire and smoke and acid. In a better situation, Zarc would have been impressed with her range (and maybe also a little turned on).

But now was not the time for that — if that piece of shit ate Ray, he’d have no chance at all!

“Bitch!” he swore at it — and he tapped into his malice.

It had been  _ years _ since he’d used this particular source of demonic energy. Rage had always come so much more naturally to him, especially once he cooled off a little, once time had eased the pain of his transformation into a demon and soothed his hatred. It crackled like the electricity of his confidence source, but it came out as a glowing purple acid, dripping from his nails like the color of some terribly poisonous plant. He flung it out in a wide arc at the creature’s legs — despite its powerful barrier, it was enough to burn huge tracks into its skin. It howled with agony. It staggered backwards, dropping to one knee, arms swinging about like mad as it tried to rebalance itself. Reira threw up, the spray flying through the air and barely missing Zarc as he darted forward.

He only had time to try and break one of them out — but which one?? If it managed to eat Ray, he was  _ done _ for — and maybe the rest of the world, too. But if he didn’t save her kid sibling, she’d probably kill him — and he’d lose his best option for freeing his friends from the monster.

He hesitated a beat too long. The monster swung its arm around and  _ slammed _ Ray into Zarc like a weapon. He rocketed through the air and slammed into a tree. It took every bit of energy he had to wrap around his borrowed body before it shattered to pieces from the blow, and when he crumpled to the ground, Yuya’s body was fine — but Zarc’s soul was overextended.

_ I can’t do this _ , he thought with a terrible sense of dread.  _ This is gonna kill me. I’m — I’m gonna lose. _

The thought spiraled through him like weight pinning him to the ground. The very idea of losing was enough to crack open a cask of despair, the weakness leaking slowly out of it, filling him up and weighing him down. Yuya screamed at him from the back of their head, but it was all Zarc could do to push up to his suddenly shaking hands and knees. 

He wasn’t strong enough. After all this time...all his struggling to get to them...

He wasn’t strong enough to save them.

Distantly, Ray shrieked with rage, with a useless but unfaltering defiance. Zarc couldn’t remember what that felt like. She was going to die, and then he would too, and then everyone else here, and the rest of his friends would be trapped in that monster along with him for the rest of eternity. They were out of options. If they couldn’t overpower this thing...

** _“STOP!!”_ **

The word crunched down on him like a lead weight, and he groaned, clapping his hands over his ears as began to shudder. He felt bile rise in his throat — what the  _ fuck _ . Shit that hit like a ton of bricks.

** _“PUT THEM DOWN!”_ **

This time, it was pretty obvious the words weren’t directed at him, which somehow made them sting less. He squinted through blurred eyes, still shaking from the weight of the words, ancient and powerful and like nothing that should be spoken in this era. But...hadn’t he heard them sometime recently? Hadn’t these been the voices that had called him awake...?

Oh shit. The girls.

Zarc staggered to his feet — actually, Zarc didn’t do anything.  _ Yuya _ was the one who leaped up to his feet.

“Yuzu!” he cried.

With Zarc still piggybacking, Yuya had made his way to control of his body again, and despite the fact that he was probably pretty banged up from the fight, he staggered forward anyway. Zarc could hear the rush of thoughts in his mind, determined and fierce:  _ They’re still fighting! We can’t give up! _

They made it back to the dais, and Yuya clambered up onto it.

The creature still had Ray and Reira in its hands, but it had staggered to its knees again, moaning with pain. The demons inside it shrieked, pressing harder for release.

At the other end of the summoning circle, Yuzu, Rin, and Selena had all joined hands, pale and shaking and smudged with dirt, but shining with determination. They opened their mouths and yelled again.

** _“PUT! THEM! DOWN!”_ **

“Son of a bitch,” Zarc mumbled through the side of Yuya’s mouth, flinching at the sounds even though Yuya being at the front shielded him a little. “I’ll be  _ damned _ . They’ve got it paralyzed.”

The creature moaned again, shaking.

And then the second thing to shock the pants off of Zarc happened. Reira managed to wriggle one arm free of the monsters grip, and pressed it hard to its hand. Their eyes flared white — and one of the bubbles in the monster’s skin popped.

The monster shrieked as a puff of black smoke escaped the burst skin along with a bubble of blood before the skin sealed back over — but it was too late. A demon had escaped!

Before it could recover, Reira pressed harder, eyes flashing white once, twice, three times, four times — four bubbles popped and scabbed, four motes of smoke escaped with shrieks of freedom as the demons escaped.

Was it just Zarc’s imagination, or did the monster look...smaller?

“That’s it!!” he shouted, coming back forward again, taking control of Yuya’s body once more. “That’s it! Keep it up, kid!”

He lunged forward. Reira freed three more demons, and then the moaning, in pain monster realized what was happening. It shrieked with rage, and lifted its hand with Reira in it up high. Reiji screamed somewhere in the distance — Reira’s face was pale with fear, but they freed two more demons even as it wound up to smash him against the stones.

Zarc’s despair was gone. His confidence surged through him once again, and electricity leaped to his finger tips. From a distance, still running, he aimed, and fired. 

Strike! Right in the eyes!

“I’ve still got it!” he whooped.

Blinded now, the monster shrieked — it released Reira and Ray as it threw its hands to its eyes to claw at the pain there. The second Ray was free, she lunged forward. She scooped Reira out of the air before they got even close to the ground, skidding to a stop beside her brother and father.

Zarc skidded back over to her, taking up a spot beside her and whirling to face the creature. It lurched about — it crashed into one of the stone pillars and shattered it. When it dropped its hands from its eyes, they were healed, but there were bloody — and there was rage and hatred in there now. Zarc tensed as he saw the poison of malic begin to bubble up under its feet, cracking the stone and starting to fill the grooves of summoning rituals. Fire began to lick at its blackened, twisted arms. It was definitely smaller from losing some of its prisoners — but now it was angry.

“I won’t let it,” Ray gasped, almost distantly. “I won’t let it take everything away from me again. I won’t let it.”

Her voice sounded almost faint, hysterical. He whipped his head towards her. Her eyes were still their bright lavender, but they were distant, face pale. Shit. She was feeling the strain, too — and it looked like panic was beginning to rise up in her, too, if the way her temperatures kept flip flopping from intense cold to intense heat against his skin was any indication. He didn’t blame her — she’d spent years thinking herself the most powerful creature on earth...but only as a shield against the panic and trauma that had caused her to become so.

Now she was faced with the last remaining dregs of the thing that had caused that drama, and found herself still useless against it. He tightened his jaw. He remembered that feeling. He remembered it too well.

She flinched when he grabbed her hand. Her eyes shot to him.

“Don’t give up,” he said. “Giving up is the worst thing a demon can do!”

_ Don’t give up, not like I almost just did,  _ he thought.  _ Before I saw what all of you could do. How you all kept fighting, even when it seemed hopeless _ .

Her eyes were wide, her face pale, and she shook against his grip.

“Even the two of us have barely made a dent in it,” she said, sounding sick with anger and fear just saying the words out loud. “What can we  _ do _ ? One more slip up and...”

Her eyes flicked back to her family, and her face went whiter.

He sucked in a breath. They had minutes — maybe only seconds — before the creature finished gathering its energy up, finished healing its wounds and went back on the offensive. He turned towards her, and took both her hands, clasping them in hers.

“What happened to all that pent up energy you hit me with?” he said.

“I thought you  _ killed _ me,” she said, lips curling.

“I didn’t. But you know who did?”

He nodded his head towards the monster — no, the human. The last cultist. Ray’s eyes flickered to him.

“You’ve spent years piling up energy — piling up every last dreg of vengeance, hatred, rage, and desire to destroy everything that hurt you. Every last fear and hope and despair at what was taken from you. You made a whole damn pocket dimension with all of that power — Ray, you’re  _ way _ more fucking powerful than me right now!”

The acid of the cultist’s malice was beginning to get dangerously close to their feet. Zarc held it back with a line of smoke, but he didn’t know for how much longer.

“ _ Use _ it,” Zarc urged. “Use every last bit of it. Pull it all through you and throw everything you’ve got at it.”

Ray’s eyes shone with actual fear now. Her hands shook against him.

“But that will use it all up,” she whispered. “It’s all I’ve had. It’s all I  _ have _ .”

_ To keep me going _ , she didn’t say out loud, but Zarc heard it in the silence anyway. Zarc smiled. Man. Demons really were all the same sometimes, huh? He could practically hear his own voice in hers.

“You don’t need it anymore,” he said. “You start fresh after you wipe it all away.”

He slid his eyes to it, releasing one of Ray’s hands and turning to face it.

“And him along with it.”

Ray’s eyes turned back to it. She stared at him — the monster, the murderer, the cultist. The thing that had stolen her life from her.

“Are you going to let them take your life from you a second time?” Zarc asked. “Or are you going to take it back?”

Ray’s hand was suddenly so tight in his it almost cracked Yuya’s bones.

“I don’t need  _ you _ to tell me that,” she hissed, and he grinned.

Then he felt her control snap back into place, hot and cold and whipping about with wind. The cultist met the rise in power with a boost of its own, the pressure in the air getting thicker and thicker, pressing them into the ground so hard that they actually sunk a few centimeters into the stone.

This was it.

Last chance.

Winner take all.


	25. Chapter 25

Death had changed everything for her.

It had not been an ending, like she’d always thought it would be. She’d never before believed in an afterlife. But when the knife had sliced open her throat, when she’d felt all of her spilling out of herself, when she’d felt the pressure of her soul crunching in on itself as it desperately tried to cling to its fragile body as each rope that tied them together was severed — she realized that death was something much worse than simple nonexistence.

The panic of her death didn’t fade. The pressure, the chains of the people who had held her captive didn’t disappear. The screaming sound of her father didn’t go away. But she, she was alone — adrift, tumbling through a thickening river of molasses that threatened to swallow her up.

For years, she’d believed that feeling was a demon. That the river that threatened to drown her long after she was already dead was the demon, coming to consume her, consume everything. It had taken her until this moment to realize it had been fear. It had been absolute terror, filling her now formless shape with weights, crushing her, shocking through her with a pain she had never felt before in her life, desperate for it to end.

And after that had come the rage. The fire that had scorched through her, that had clawed at that endless drowning presence, trying to tear it away from her — now she knew it had only been a shield. It had only been a casing she’d wrapped around herself, to push down the fear. To believe that even through the pain, the hurt, the panic, and the trauma, she was still in control.

And the moment the fire had given her enough clarity to see the people still standing around her, the knife still dripping with her blood, the murderers who had taken everything from her — 

She’d wrapped the rage so tightly around herself that she had been reborn.

Ray gasped, digging her hand into Zarc’s as she dug her heels into the earth and felt for that crack in the earth, the place she’d thought was the portal to hell that she had emerged from, that gave her her strength.

She saw it, now. She saw every layer, every overflowing glass of anger, of fear, of rage, of terror, of sadness, of loneliness, of trauma, of every bit of her that she had sheathed herself in as she sought vengeance. It was a portal to hell — but not the one she had imagined. It was the hell she had made of herself. The monster she had become. The monster she would make herself one last time, to end this for good.

_ You are not a monster _ , Ruri whispered in her head suddenly.  _ You didn’t become a monster. _

As though in a dream, Ray imagined she saw the girl before her, the soft, slender shape that had a face so like her own, hands gripping hers. Ruri held Ray’s hands to her lips, closing her eyes, as though she were a mother comforting her.

_ You are not a monster, _ Ruri said again.  _ You are a survivor. _

And like that, it was as though something clicked.

Hot tears rolled down Ray’s face as she stared the cultist down. As she watched his skin bubble and break with the screaming, trapped faces of the demons within it. The shadows and smoke and lighting that began to deepen around it in a terrible aura of power. Souls trapped and lost, just like her. Desperate and afraid, just like her. Their lives taken from them, as hers was.

“A survivor,” Ray whispered, testing the word again.

The earth before their feet cracked open. Ray didn’t flinch, though Zarc swore, his hand crunching into hers a little tighter, as the stone split. The cultist’s growing puddle of acid slid down the side of it, disappearing into the depths before it could reach them. 

Light poured out from the chasm — an aurora of purples and whites and reds, the flickering of fire against a cave wall as the depths of Ray’s pain began to bubble up from the cracks. 

She felt it — the power pouring through her. Ruri’s hands were still holding hers, like a ghost, standing between her and the monster. The cultist’s eyes burned, with hate and hunger and malice. The same eyes that had stared down at her as the knife entered her skin. For a moment, Ray crumpled. For a moment, she felt herself wither, back to the terrified girl she had been back then, the helpless, powerless victim tied to the altar at the whims of the monsters that held her down.

_ You are a survivor _ .

Ray sucked in a breath, as the power of her pain began to bubble up within her once again. She squeezed Ruri’s hands. Then she let her go, and stepped beyond her — stepped directly out of Ruri’s body, as it sagged back into Zarc’s waiting arms.

Ray stood before the chasm of her hate, meeting eyes with the creature that would rip her to pieces.

“You thought you could kill me,” she said. “You thought you could control me. You thought you could control everyone and everything.”

She lifted her hands — they were  _ her _ hands, for the first time in six years. Her hair flew around her face, twisted up into the twin-tails she had once worn. She knew she had changed. She knew that the eyes of the entire battlefield were on her, taking in what had changed, though perhaps no one had quite been able to parse it yet. She hadn’t, herself. Her body was her own, but it was new. It was reforged. No.

It was taken  _ back _ .

The light of her world of hurt and pain rose to meet her, rose to wrap itself around her arms and her legs and her body — but this time, it would not consume her. This time, she was the one in control.

The cultist shrieked with the voices of a thousand captive demons, and then his power, too, wrapped about his arms like a bubbling black tar, and he surged towards her. She snapped her arms up. The rage of the chasm rose to meet her, wrapping itself around her like armor.

She caught his advance with both of her hands. The tar burned at her skin, and he grinned down at her. She snarled back, she dug her heels into the ground. The power of her pain exploded from the chasm, emptied, and then it was  _ all _ within her. 

With a shriek, she whipped him away from her. He rocketed through the air, slamming into one of the remaining pillars and smashing it to dust. He didn’t slam to the ground, instead moving much faster than his huge body should allow him to, flipping back onto his feet and immediately going for her again.

She braced herself — then saw his eyes flicker.

He wasn’t aiming at her. He was aiming behind her — at Reira. Reiji. Her father.

No. That trick wouldn’t work again. 

Ray’s shimmering aura of power expanded from her like a wall. He slammed into it, ricocheting off and immediately shooting back towards her, as though he thought that she might be thrown off guard by the quick change in target. She caught him by the hand again, swinging him around.

Tar and acid oozed from his pores, dripping down against her as she released him — it burned against her skin and she shrieked, her aura burning it away. What remained suddenly hardened, swelled, grew like snakes around her arms and torso, trying to pin her down. 

He seized her as she struggled, gripping her in one hand and squeezing her — but she was no longer in a mortal body. She turned to air and smoke, slipping between his fingers, landing in front of him — ice raked from her fingers like knives, slicing him open from the core to the chin. Blood sprayed from his body before it could seal over again, and she flung the stain from her skin as she pressed her advantage.

The burning light of everything that had made her crunched in around them, as she pushed him back, hand to hand, the two of them wrestling with the other — their hands pushed against each other as their auras crashed into the other, as lightning and fire rained down around them in a storm that exploded like bomber planes, singing their skin and hair before it healed again. Still, her aura contracted, drawing them into a single ring, where only they remained — only two monsters fighting for dominance.

Only a survivor and a monster.

“You tried to take everything from me,” she hissed through her teeth.

The heat was beginning to bite at her skin, not just her own heat alone, but his as well — she saw his skin beginning to burn away in flakes. She saw him starting to shrink, overextending the resources of his power. She felt her own power draining, felt her own body starting to flake away from the intense heat of their battle. He was still grinning, still laughing madly, hungrily, still trying to swallow her whole. Trying to make her feel small again, helpless again, a victim again.

She dug her heels into the earth. She tightened her grip.

“You tried,” she said again. “But. You. Took.  _ Nothing _ .”

The heat bit at her, from outside and from within. Anger. Rage. Pain. Fear. Panic. Terror. Trauma. It all burned through her. Everything that he and those like him had made her feel. Every bit of smallness they had tried to foster in her. Every bit of hate they had put into her.

And then something else, too. Courage. Will. Protectiveness. Her family, out there, watching her. The strength of those she’d lured into this game, who didn’t give up even through everything she had put them through, who even now she thought she could hear screaming her name, like the cheers of a distant crowd.

A fierce, undying fire, hotter and colder all at once, burst to life in her chest. Unlike rage, unlike confidence, unlike malice. It was something new, something more powerful than anything else she had ever felt, and she fed everything into it. Fed every last scrap of her power into that flame, feeding anger and pain and fear into it, melting it down into something brand new.

_ Victory _ .

“You took  _ NOTHING FROM ME! _ ”

He was her size, now, an ordinary human, all vestiges of his monstrosity burned away save for his monstrous laughter, his monstrous hunger in his burning eyes. The fire within her burned outwards — and then, with everything she had left, she screamed out one last cry, pushing every last bit of her out — 

The earth beneath her responded. She  _ pushed _ . The man tried to grope towards her once more, lunging — and then the earth burst from the ground, and impaled him straight through the heart.

Her aura dissipated. The fire within her burned out. He hung there, stabbed clean through and hanging, face-down, just above her head, the spike of earth splitting through his suddenly small, human body.

The monster spasmed. Its body jerked. For one moment, it attempted to reach for her again, normal-sized hands now clawing at the air inches from her face. She didn’t flinch. She only stared at it with a curious sense of indifference. 

Like this, he was so small. So helpless. So...inconsequential. And yet, he, and so many other inconsequential people, had stolen everything away from her. 

She felt no pity as she watched his body spasm once more against its pole. As she watched his hands grope towards her face, the blood flecking his still wildly grinning teeth.

Then blood burst between his lips. His arms slumped. His head keeled forward. And the twitching of his body gave way to a deep, untouchable stillness.

Ray stared up at him for a long, long moment. At the broken body, slumped as it was, impaled the spike, hanging face down. Broken. Empty. Something like that seemed to be rising up within her — emptiness. Oh.

It was over. 

It was all over, and her purpose for existence was...gone. She felt the emptiness begin to claw at her insides, eating at the space left behind by the power she had expended. Over. It was all over. It was over, and now, now what was there for her?

And then...the body twitched once more. 

Ray tensed, but she was so  _ weak _ , she was so empty, she couldn’t fight anymore — 

A torrent of light exploded from within the empty body. Ray staggered back, eyes wide. Her mouth hung open at the geyser that suddenly reached up towards the night sky, like — like fireworks. Little lights, embers from a fire, danced from the top of the geyser, falling around them like dancing fireflies.

Laughter echoed from the bobbing lights, squeals of delight, cries of — freedom.

The freed demons scattered through the air like floating lamps. They filled the entire clearing, dancing and shining and laughing with such abandon that Ray felt as though something had lit up within her. She saw them dance before the faces of the onlookers, saw Reiji’s eyes widen as one flickered past his face, and Reira burst out into a grin as they reached to cup one in their hands, closing their eyes as they nuzzled against it. Her father stared up at them, the lights glimmering in his eyes as he stared with awe. Selena looked like she was going to start crying, and she did as two of the lights nuzzled against her face, and one played at the edges of her hair. Ruri tiredly lifted one hand up to one near her as she leaned back against Zarc, smiling faintly at the touch of it against her finger. Yuzu and Rin still gripped each other’s hands, still trembled, as they both looked around at the suddenly alight clearing with huge, awed eyes. Even Yuuri and Kurosaki, with their injuries, had managed to prop themselves up with Yugo’s and Yuto’s help, and they all watched the lights send a soft, gentle glow around the torn apart summoning circle, as though they were at a festival watching the fireworks.

Even the circle, the horrible memory of Ray’s death — under their light, it seemed a little like...like perhaps the opposite of hell. As though she had ascended to some place where light and laughter were forever, and she, against all odds, found herself wrapped up in the swell of their joy.

Some of the orbs of light began to swirl around her in a slow whirlwind, brushing against her skin and sending ticklish tingles through her, and before she knew what she was doing, she laughed. She laughed, too, laughed along with the free demons, laughed along with them as they all swirled about her and brushed against her and sent their tingling sense of gratitude through her skin.

_ Thank you! _

_ Thank you! _

_ Thank you!! _

The lights swirled tightly around her, for a moment enclosing her within a pillar of light, of nothing but the purest of adulation and joy, and she reached her hands up towards them, dipping them into the stream of light, and she  _ laughed _ .

The lights caressed her face, her hair, and then, one by one, they all filtered up into the sky. They slipped between her fingers with the tiniest of sounds, the faintest of piano music and wind chimes, and then they were gone — blending in among the stars overhead, and then winking out, one by one.

Ray stood with her arms still raised towards the sky. Her skin still tingled.

She wasn’t sure how long she might have stood there, staring up at and reaching for the stars. Then a soft hand alighted on her shoulder, and she turned, her hair sliding from her face as she began to realize the tremble in her body.

Zarc smiled at her — not with Yuya’s lips, but with what must be his own. He stood before her, not as the horrific monster she had once imagined. In fact, he looked a lot like the boys he had once shared a body with, if a little older and taller, with a smoother face — and with eyes a brilliant gold within deep black pools.

“You won,” he said.

It was all she needed to hear. The last bit of everything slotted into place, and her knees shook. She let him hold her by the shoulders rather than fall, and the tears began to roll down her cheeks, hot and wet.

She won.

She survived.

It was over...and she no longer feared it.

* * *

The first thing Yuya registered was that he heard someone’s watch ticking. His eyes fluttered, and he shifted, groaning as he realized just how dry his throat was.

“Oh thank god.” Yuzu gasped, and he opened his eyes.

Yuzu hung over him, her pigtails almost in his eyes. She wasn’t the one propping him up, though. Reiji held him gently against the shoulders, and when Yuya’s eyes focused on the people above him, Reiji’s face melted with relief. He closed his eyes behind his cracked glasses, and his body slumped.

Yuya twisted his head towards Yuzu, feeling her tears scatter over his face.

“Did...did we win?” he mumbled.

“She did it,” Yuzu said. “She beat it. Reira exorcised the last of the demons, and they’re all gone now. They all went back home.”

She bit her lip then, turning her head over her shoulder.

“Or, well...not all of them.”

Yuya blinked. Now that he was awake, he felt way more alert now. His body was a little bruised, but he didn’t have a problem sitting up, even when Reiji began to protest that he needed to rest.

The summoning circle, or what it had been, was in shambles. Not a hint of the carvings from before remained, all of the pillars crumbled, the altar completely annihilated. Nothing but a clearing full of rubble and stone remained. Everyone was....everyone was still here. Kurosaki leaned against Yuto, looking pale but alive, with Ruri checking his forehead. Yuuri was actually on his feet, glaring down at his broken glasses, while Yugo and Rin were hugging so tightly that it was difficult to tell where one of them ended and the other began. Reira leaned against Reiji’s shoulder, looking tired, but smiled when they met Yuya’s eyes. Selena was here too, standing off to the side. Her robes were torn, and the clothes he’d seen her wearing at school were visible beneath the shredded tatters.

His eyes came to the center, then, and he saw them.

They must be Ray and Zarc, he reasoned, though he’d never seen either of them before. They looked more...human than he’d imagined. Ray looked like an older Yuzu, with long auburn hair in perfect twintails. There was absolutely something ethereal about her, though, something inhuman — something about the way she seemed to give off light, like there was a fire in her chest that glowed faintly through her skin. Something about the way the air seemed to bend around her made Yuya certain she was no longer human.

And the man beside her, he had a face a lot like Yuya’s, if he were ten years older, and had spiraling black horns coming from his forehead and twisting into his silver hair — and also glowing gold eyes with black sclera. Despite these discomforting features, though, there was a softness to the way he held himself, making him seem non-threatening. And he really wasn’t, Yuya thought, remembering how it had felt to temporarily host him.

With help from Reiji, he stood up, feeling shaky, but otherwise okay. Ray looked down at the ground, and Zarc let out a soft chuckle. He took her by the hand and pulled her towards them, and she made an offended noise.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she said.

“Making sure you don’t get all emo on me. Come see your family before we go.”

Reiji’s hand stiffened on Yuya’s back before it fell away. Yuzu gripped Yuya’s hand as the two demons approached them.

Up close, the glow of Ray’s skin was even more prominent, and the unnatural sheen of her eyes was more visible. She continued to stare at the ground for a somewhat awkward moment.

“I owe you all an apology,” she said.

Yuuri laughed.

“Oh god, do you ever,” he said.

Ray tightened her lips together, and Zarc just rolled his eyes with a grin.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said. “So let’s not linger.”

“Where are you going to go?” Reiji asked, as Leo made a soft, broken sound behind him.

Ray blinked back what looked like tears.

“I can’t stay here anymore,” she said. “I’m...I’m a demon now. We can’t...”

She lifted her eyes up to Reiji, then down to Reira, and then to her father. Her eyes glistened, and tears began to run in crystalline tracks down her cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” she breathed, her voice tight. “I’m so sorry. All I did...”

Reira moved first. They jumped from the ground, ran forward, and threw their arms around her waist. Ray broke down. She fell to her knees, throwing her arms around Reira and holding them close. Reiji fell to his knees, too, wrapping arms around the two of them, and then Leo moved forward, joining the embrace.

Yuya stepped back with Yuzu, giving them space. Zarc shifted away, too, and then his eyes slid over to Yuya.

“So,” he said, rubbing beneath his nose. “You and I have got a lil unfinished business.”

Yuzu immediately squeezed Yuya’s hand, eyes fiery as she stepped between them.

“What does that mean?” she demanded.

“Whoa, whoa, princess,” Zarc laughed, holding up his talon tipped hands. “I’m not about to steal his soul or anything.”

He raised his eyebrows and grinned, though Yuzu didn’t look convinced. Yuya tilted his head at Zarc, a little confused.

“What do you mean by that, then?” he said.

“You and I, we had a deal, right?” Zarc said. “I’d close Ray’s portal, and you’d help me free my friends. Well, as it happens, Ray closed her own portal, but you still helped me out a lot. So I owe you something.”

“You already practically saved all of us,” Yuya said. “Without you, who knows what would have happened...”

Zarc rolled his eyes.

“God, you are so unimaginative. Never, ever become a demon summoner, all right? You’re gonna get taken advantage of.”

He leaned forward, and Yuzu reluctantly let him, though she kept her glare on him.

“Demons don’t do work for free, and we don’t take it for free either. So you’d better come up with something, or I might make up something that turns out to be nasty.”

He wiggled his fingers and winked, and Yuya couldn’t help but smile slightly. He was kind of goofy.

His eyes slid to Ray, to Reiji and his family. To the others, everyone scattered about the the remains of the terrible night. The bodies still hidden in the trees, and the memory of everything that had led to tonight.

“I just don’t want anything like this to happen to us or anyone ever again,” he said softly.

Zarc’s smile faded, and he looked serious then. He nodded.

“Me neither,” he said, leaning back. He cracked his knuckles. “All right. Ray’s pops wasn’t wrong when he said there would be other cultists out there, just in case tonight went to shit. Would you like me to take care of them for ya?”

Yuya fought back some bile, and looked down.

“I don’t really want anyone to die anymore,” he said at a whisper. “Even them. There’s been too much.”

When he looked up again, Zarc’s smile was back. He ruffled Yuya’s hair.

“You are  _ too nice _ ,” he said. “Don’t worry, kid. I’ve got other ways of making sure they don’t try this bullshit again. On my honor.”

He stuck his hand out, and Yuya looked at it for a moment.

“You’re sure you’re not going to take my soul?” he half-joked as he reached for Zarc’s hand.

“I really don’t want it, honest. Wouldn’t match my interior decorating. And anyway, didn’t I say that  _ I _ owe  _ you _ ?”

Yuya couldn’t help but laugh. He took Zarc’s hand and they shook on it. He thought he might have felt a faint spark pass between their palms, but it was gone by the time they released each other. Zarc put his hands behind his head, and looked up at the sky. It was still full dark, but now Yuya could see all of the stars. And the moon was right overhead, now.

“Ray, we’re going to have to go,” Zarc said, looking down at his hand. It was suddenly see-through, Yuya saw with a start. “I’ve got a contract to finish up.”

Slowly, Ray extracted herself from her family embrace. She contined to grip their arms, face stained with tears.

“I’m glad I got to see you all again,” she whispered.

“Is this goodbye for good?” Reiji asked.

Ray cracked a small smile through her tears.

“Who knows?” she said. “I’m a demon now. Maybe you can find a way to summon me for holidays.”

Her hands shook. She was starting to look see-through, too. She stood, releasing her family and taking a step back.

“Thank you,” she said. “For not giving up on me.”

Then her eyes turned to Yuya, and then to each of the boys, one after the other.

“And thank you all,” she whispered. “After all I tried to do...after all I  _ did _ ...I didn’t deserve your help.”

Yuya smiled, but it was Yuzu who answered.

“No one ever deserves help,” she said. “But in the end...you saved us, too.”

Ray didn’t look very convinced, but she smiled slightly. Her eyes turned, then to Selena. The pair of them stared at each other for a long, long moment.

Then tears began to roll down Selena’s cheeks. She stumbled forward, and Ray threw her arms out to meet her, letting the girl fall against her.

“Thank you,” Selena gasped. “You — you protected me, all these years, you protected me, thank you, thank you, thank you —”

Ray said nothing, at least, nothing that Yuya could hear, as she squeezed back more tears, and stroked Selena’s hair, holding her tight.

“What now?” Selena sobbed. “I can’t — I did so much wrong — what do I do without you? Where do I go?”

Ray looked up, and Yuya turned to see where she looked. Ruri, stepping towards them, her hand outstretched. Ray gently pushed Selena up by the shoulders, and turned her towards Ruri. Selena stared at her, eyes wide, tears still staining her cheeks.

“You come back with us,” Ruri said softly.

Selena looked like she might break down again. The tears began to fall again. She seemed to sway, her eyes flickering, perhaps with guilt, with a feeling of not deserving Ruri’s words, with a thousand thoughts that Yuya could hardly even begin to imagine. But Ray took her by the hand, and gently, gently, guided Selena’s hand to Ruri’s. 

Then she stepped back, away from her, and Selena whipped back towards her.

“Thank you!” she cried again. “No matter what happened, if — if you hadn’t been with me, Ray, I would have...”

Ray blinked back more tears. Her eyes swept across all of those there. Then she bit her lip, and her eyes came to rest on her father. 

Something seemed to drain from him as she stepped towards him, and he took her hands in his when she reached for them, drawing them up to his bent forehead.

“Reiji was right,” he whispered. “I should have been a better father to you during this.”

Ray didn’t respond, only smiling with a mixture of pain, grief, and relief. She closed her eyes.

“Papa,” she said. “I want to make things right.”

As though he understood what she needed, he nodded before she had to say anything else. He moved her hands against his chest, over his heart and released her. Ray held that position for one more moment, eyes filled with tears.

“Goodbye, everyone,” she said. “And thank you.”

She pulled her hands away from Leo’s chest, and a burning ball of fiery light came with it. Leo swayed, and Reiji leaped to catch him — all at once, it was as though the strength had melted out of the man. He was thin, now, like someone who had been in the hospital for months and months.

Ray held the ball of power aloft in her palm. She closed her eyes, and whispered something Yuya could not hear.

When Yuya opened his eyes again, he lay in his bed in his dorm, staring up at the ceiling. His body was light, as though he had simply had a very long, very deep sleep.

He lifted one of his hands to his face, and stared at his palm. Against his palm, he saw a faint mark — as though he’d been burned, there. Right where he had felt the spark from Zarc’s handshake. 

And as he watched, the burn mark flickered. It swelled for just a moment, and then, silently, faded completely away.

_ Job’s done _ , he thought he heard Zarc’s voice in his head.  _ Get some more sleep, kid. You need it. Anyway. See ya around, or not! _

Yuya smiled. Then he let his hand fall to his chest, closed his eyes, and gratefully took Zarc up on his suggestion.


	26. Epilogue

“It actually happened though, right?” Yuya said over his coffee. “It wasn’t a dream, was it?”

Reiji blew against the steam of his own coffee, eyes fixed on it. His glasses weren’t cracked anymore, and Yuya wasn’t sure why he would have thought they would be. Nothing seemed to have remained from the longest night of their lives. Yuzu stirred her tea, staring at it as though it held the meaning of life inside its brown depths.

An autumn breeze curled through the outdoor cafe, and a nearby tree began to scatter tiny yellow leaves over the sidewalk. The sky shone blue and clear as glass over their heads.

“It happened,” Reiji said, finally. “I don’t see how it could not have. My sister’s case still remains in police records. My security feeds confirm I was not in my house that night. My car was out of gas when I checked on it.”

“So just. Poof, huh?” Yuzu said. “Like it never happened.

“I suppose she thought it was the least she could do.”

Yuya took a scalding sip of his coffee, and blew out against his tongue. Someone laughed at something they heard on the phone as they walked past.

“But what  _ did _ she do?” Yuzu said.

“A contract, I presume,” Reiji said. “As demons do.”

He fixed his glasses.

“She had given my father power to leave his hospital bed, or else he would have been an emaciated husk attempting to walk around that building. She simply took it back as payment for putting us...well, for putting us back.”

Yuzu lifted her eyes from her tea, bouncing the bag up and down in the cup by the tag.

“Is your dad...” she started, looking a little conflicted. Yuya didn’t blame her. The last time he’d seen Akaba Leo, he’d been pointing a gun at him. He wasn’t in any hurry to meet him again, even if he had changed his tune.

“He’s alive,” Reiji said, in a tight, clipped tone that indicated his feelings were also complicated. “He regained consciousness a few days ago. They expect him to make a full recovery now.”

No one knew what to say to that, and all of them looked down at their drinks. Another breeze rustled the leaves, and dishes clinked against silverware at the tables nearby.

“Any records of your kidnappings, however...or any of the events of last night...they’re gone. The motel is gone as well, along with any signs of the cult or their bodies. Ray very perfectly tied up all of the loose ends, it seems,” Reiji said.

Yuya rested his head on his chin and looked out at the city, watching the cars that meandered past. He breathed in deep.

“The others are all back, too, then?” he said.

“From what I understand. I haven’t contacted any of them. I only...checked that they were where they were supposed to be.”

Yuya tried his coffee again. This time it wasn’t too hot, or maybe his tongue was just fried. For another long, long moment, no one spoke.

“Everyone accounted for,” Yuzu said, with a distant sort of voice. “Everyone except...”

She trailed off, and when Yuya looked at her, her eyes were faraway. He stared down at his coffee again, and suddenly, didn’t really want it. 

Selena hadn’t reappeared. She wasn’t  _ gone _ , because Masumi had been mass-texting the whole theater chat for days now, asking if anyone had heard from Selena. She was still in the student records, according to Reiji. But she was simply gone. While Reiji hadn’t tried to get in contact with anyone, Yuya had. He, Yuto, and Yugo were in a group text now — Yuuri had laughed at Yuya when he’d called and hung up the phone (though Yugo said he’d been showing up at the gas station where Rin worked and had been pestering them now and then). Yuto said that Selena hadn’t shown up at their college either.

“What now?” Yuya said. “Going back to normal seems. Wrong, somehow.”

Reiji took a long sip of his coffee.

“I think going on as normal is the only thing we can do,” he said. “If we should have learned anything from this incident, perhaps it’s that...we must continue to live. To the best of our ability...live as we wish our lives to be.”

Yuya couldn’t help but smile a little at that. It was sort of deep, but Reiji delivered the line with all of the gravity of an accountant reading off the yearly budget.

“Says the person still doodling demon symbols in his notebooks during rehearsal breaks,” Yuzu said, raising her eyebrows.

Reiji quickly fixed his glasses, which Yuya understood as a move to hide his blush.

“It’s research,” he said.

“Yeah?” Yuzu said.

Reiji coughed into his hand, and took a deep gulp of his coffee. He put it back down on the table, then, and looked up at the two of them. 

“Zarc’s cult had much research to their name,” he said. “Even if Zarc did, as you say, find ways of neutralizing them...they can’t have been the only ones out there with this sort of information.”

“Do you think something like this will ever happen again?” Yuya asked, feeling cold.

“I think that as long as demons and humans both exist, and their knowledge of each other exists, there will always be someone out to exploit that knowledge,” Reiji said. “And there will always be others like Ray. Other angry souls who become demons.”

Yuzu bit her lip, exchanging a glance with Yuya. Yuya looked up at Reiji again.

“So what are we going to do about it?” Yuya said.

Reiji pressed his lips together.

“‘ _ We’ _ are not going to do anything,” he said. “ _ I _ have been tracking the incidence of possible supernatural happenings, just to keep an eye on things.”

“And then what? You’re just gonna watch?”

“No, I...I’m still deciding what to do with this information,” Reiji said, fixing his glasses again. “But you two do not need to involve yourselves. It’s bad enough I got the two of you mixed up in my family’s tragedy.”

Yuya and Yuzu exchanged a look again. Then they both looked at Reiji with raised eyebrows.

“We aren’t stupid, Reiji,” Yuzu said. 

“You’re already making some kind of plans, right? To start researching and tracking down things?” Yuya said. “We’re not letting you do it alone.”

Reiji glared at the two of them, but it was half-hearted.

“You have a higher estimation of my current planning than I actually have,” he said, sounding tired. “Yes, I have been researching. But at the moment, I don’t know where to begin.”

“Maybe...maybe I can help.”

All three of them started, and Yuzu half rose in her seat, eyes widening. On the other side of the fence closing in the outdoor cafe, Selena stood, eyes cast away from them, gripping at one arm. She looked...well, she looked better, Yuya thought. There was color in her cheeks. Her hair was down, and her eyes were clear, even if she seemed to be having trouble looking them in the eyes.

“Selena!” Yuzu gasped, her voice choked.

Before Selena could say another word, she had run around the table, leaned over the fence, and thrown her arms around Selena’s shoulders. Selena’s eyes widened, and heat exploded over her cheeks.

“I...” she mumbled.

“Where have you  _ been _ ?” Yuzu demanded, leaning back and gripping her by the shoulders. “We were worried  _ sick _ !  _ I _ was worried sick!”

Selena looked a little shell-shocked, mouth hanging open and eyes wide. She swallowed.

“I...I thought I needed to stay away,” she said. “After everything I did.”

She put her hands on top of Yuzu’s, then, biting her lip.

“But after some time, I realized...what I need to do is atone, not avoid,” she said. “I need to make up for everything. To you. To myself. To everyone.”

She lifted her eyes up to the three of them, looking at each of them in turn.

“I still remember a lot of what I was taught,” she said. “And you’re right, Reiji. We weren’t the only demon cult out there. There were others — others we conflicted with, and probably more I don’t even know of. And demons can be born from anyone, at any time.”

She slipped from Yuzu’s grip, and turned to face all three of them.

“So if there’s something you plan to do, some way that I can put what I know to the good of everyone,” she said. “I want to help.”

Yuya glanced at Reiji. Reiji looked like he was crossed between relief, frustration, and reluctantly giving in. Yuya smiled, and he stood up, walking over to Yuzu and Selena. He reached over the fence and grabbed Selena’s hand, then he grabbed Yuzu’s. After a beat, Yuzu reached back for Reiji, pulling him from his seat and to the rest of them, standing in a circle of sorts.

“That makes us a team, then, huh?” Yuya said.

“I don’t want you all to get involved with this,” Reiji grumbled.

Yuzu only laughed, and Selena smiled tentatively. Yuzu released the hands she held, and threw her arms around the group’s shoulders, pulling Selena in too across the fence.

“Oh, it is  _ way  _ too late for  _ that _ .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it's finally done!! I ended up adding one more chapter, but I'm sure y'all don't mind a little extra content haha. Thank you all so much for sticking with this fic even as I felt like it was really going off the rails and I no longer felt like I had control over the story, not to mention dragging it out until January long after Halloween was over haha. I hope you enjoyed your time with it, and I hope to see you in future works! Thank you for your support!! <3


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